The End Is Where We Start From
by Telynaur
Summary: CoE fixit.  Instead of dying at Thames House, an alien being who owes Jack a favour sends Jack and Ianto to another reality where they have a chance to rebuild their lives.  Rated T to begin with but will rise to M in later chapters
1. Prologue

**Prologue:**

"_Don't."_

Lost in his grief as he watched Ianto slip away from him, Jack abruptly felt every hackle he possessed stand on end. Given his experience, he was fully aware when the flow of time changed around him and right now it had come to a halt. His skin prickled as he lifted his head to look around a little wildly, hoping against hope that the Doctor had arrived in the nick of time and was doing something that might save the man Jack abruptly realised he loved more than honour, life or morality.

There was no sign of the familiar blue box or the lanky frame of the Timelord. Instead there was a woman standing just to one side of him. She was spectacular for her sheer ordinariness. Average height, mid-brown hair cut in a non-descript style, pale blue eyes and slightly plump figure. Clothes that looked like something an ordinary housewife would wear. Utterly, perfectly ordinary in every way, standing in the middle of a room where the atmosphere was lethal to humans, and her very ordinariness made her extraordinary.

She smiled at him kindly. "Hello, Jack."

Jack blinked, wondering if he had momentarily lost his mind and was hallucinating. He was distracted as he felt Ianto shift in his grasp and couldn't hold back the harsh, shuddering breath he pulled in when he saw that Ianto no longer looked like he was dying. He looked like he was asleep instead but he failed to respond when Jack shook him frantically.

"He won't wake up right now," the woman said gently. "He's caught between one heartbeat and another and quite safe for the moment."

"He's… _we're_… dying," Jack whispered.

"In this timeline, yes, you are," the woman said calmly.

It took a minute, which Jack spent staring down at the face he had realised far too late that he loved to distraction and would do anything to keep safe. Something eventually clicked inside his head and he lifted his head to stare at her suspiciously. "In _this_ timeline?" he echoed, making it a question. When she nodded, giving him an encouraging smile, he gave her a hopeful look. "Did the Doctor send you?"

A shadow passed across her face and she shook her head. "No, he didn't send me. I came because of you."

Jack ignored the stab of disappointment he felt at the fact that the Doctor wasn't coming and confusion soon pushed it aside. "I don't understand. I don't know you?" Despite his conviction, he ended his statement on a questioning note.

Again the wave of sadness passed across her face but the smile she gave him was soft and gentle. "You don't remember me," she explained, "but our paths crossed once, long ago, and you did me a tremendous service, at great personal cost to yourself. You lost your memories but you saved an entire reality, Jack, and I promised that I would be here when you needed me the most."

Jack's eyes widened. "I lost two years of my memories…"

The woman – being – inclined her head. "Yes, you did. Partly to save you from being the focus for revenge and partly because you learned things that made you a danger to the Timelords and the Time Agency. If your memories had been left intact they would have come after you."

"You? _You_ were the one who took my memories?" Jack demanded. "I thought it was the Time Agency!"

"No, they would have extracted what they wanted to know and then they would have killed you. You had already shown yourself to be able to throw off their conditioning when they demanded that you act too far outside your true nature. When they caught up with you and realised what had happened, they thought to keep you close and work on seeing if they could retrieve the memories but you had broken their conditioning and escaped them."

A proud smile curved her lips and Jack felt the warmth of her proud gaze. "My marvellous Captain. The saviour of my universe. I didn't have the time to give you what you wanted then as I had to go back and stabilise what had been rescued, but I marked you and swore I would come when you needed me most. This is that moment."

Jack caught his breath again and returned his attention back to Ianto's still form. "Can you save him?" he begged.

"I can save you both, but with a condition."

Jack gave her a mirthless smile. "There's always a price."

She inclined her head. "I would consider it a condition but it is true that I _am_ asking you to give something up." She leaned a little closer and placed a hand on Jack's shoulder. He was surprised at the level of warmth that seeped through the layers of clothing. "I can save Ianto and banish the 456 from the Earth. I can also free you from your curse of immortality."

"_What?"_ Jack's head snapped up as he stared at her incredulously. "But the Doctor said-"

She snorted, a scowl replacing the fond smile she had had on her face. "The Doctor is not half as clever as he likes to think he is and there are times when he is excessively selfish. There was always a way of 'curing' you, Jack, but it was one that held an element of risk for the Doctor and he decided that-" She suddenly stopped.

"And he decided that I wasn't worth it," Jack finished quietly. He knew he was right by the wince she gave.

"He would have had to take you to another reality and leave you there. There was a risk that he would not have been able to return to this reality, because of the way the cracks shift and change. He has risked it before but that was for Rose and Rose… was special."

Jack managed a shaky smile. "It's okay. I realised a while back that I was never going to have his full approval. I was never going to be one of the special ones."

She sighed and nodded. "He's an idiot," she said and smiled a little impishly at the surprised crack of laughter that Jack gave. "Jack, your immortality is tied to this reality and this reality alone. It doesn't matter where in space and time you are or whether or not you're in a time loop or a dimensional pocket; you're still in this reality and you remain immortal."

"But if I go to another reality," Jack said slowly, the pieces falling together. Just for a moment he felt a flare of excitement, of joy, but then his attention was drawn back to Ianto's still face. "But what about him?"

"He is dying in this timeline. He is supposed to die in this timeline. If I cure him and he continues to live in this timeline then there will be consequences. Nothing like that will happen if he continues to live in another timeline. With someone who cares a great deal for him."

"Who loves him," Jack corrected, his throat tight with tears – either joyful or dismayed, he wasn't sure. "I couldn't say it. It felt so shallow to wait until he was dying to say it. So ungrateful."

"You can say it now, if you like," she said gently and reached down a hand to touch a single finger to the space between Ianto's closed eyes.

Jack felt his lover wake up in his arms, the slate-coloured eyes opening and gazing up at him. Confused, at first, but then with gradually dawning realisation.

"Jack?" There was still a faint rasp to that glorious voice as Ianto looked at him and then flicked a glance towards the woman. "What-?"

"We've got a second chance, Ianto," Jack said, swiftly explaining what he'd been told. His marvellous lover took it all in and processed it without a single superfluous question and Jack felt a deep warmth that had nothing to do with lust.

"Rhiannon?" Ianto asked. "Jack's family?"

The woman shook her head. "They have their own lives to lead, just as Gwen Cooper does. This is an adventure for those dead to this world. Will you come with me, Jack Harkness and Ianto jones? Will you make a new life in my reality and leave this one behind?"

Jack could see the answer in Ianto's eyes, knew that it was shining in his own. A chance at a mortal life, with a man he had come to love and respect, as a colleague, friend and lover? It was more than he could ever have hoped to have. And yet he had responsibilities and while it clawed his heart out, he had to consider them. "What about Gwen? And Cardiff? With Torchwood gone…" He desperately hoped that Ianto would understand that he had to ask.

"And the 456. They're menacing the entire world," Ianto added. Jack chided himself for ever doubting this man. "We can't claim happiness for ourselves and abandon our duty and responsibilities."

She laughed, fond exasperation on her face. "Was there ever such a pair? I will deal with the 456. I have no liking for beings who feed off the dreams and innocence of children. The Rift will be closing soon because of something the Doctor will do. Gwen will survive and prosper. She has friends and the government will have far too much to worry about once the 456 have vanished to concern themselves over one woman. I will send a message to Martha Jones. She will assume it is from the Doctor and will watch over Gwen. Torchwood's time has passed for the moment. It will rise again but under a new mission statement and that will be several centuries into the future."

Jack felt a surge of elation as the only real barrier to his accepting the offer crumbled. It hurt in a small dull way that he had to leave Alice and Stephen behind but he had long since accepted that Alice would never really accept him wholeheartedly the way he longed for her to do and he dreaded the day when Stephen would realise that his 'uncle' wasn't ageing. "What about Rhiannon?" he asked Ianto.

Ianto shifted and sat up, still a little too pale but no longer gasping for life, and looked over his shoulder to where the 456 were standing frozen behind a silvery shimmer of arrested huon particles. "We've not been close for too long. We love one another best when we're apart. Besides," he bit his lip, "if I stay here then I die and she'd grieve for me anyway." He turned to look at Jack, almost shy. "Would I be enough for you?"

Jack exploded into laughter at that ridiculous question. "Oh, Ianto, if you only knew! I should be the one asking you that question!" He sobered at the flicker of uncertainty in the other man's eyes. He'd been an idiot, trying to distance himself from Ianto in an effort to escape the pain he knew would be inevitable. And it had been a futile thing to do. "Yes, Ianto, you'll be more than enough for me. We'll build a new life together." He turned a questioning look in the woman's direction.

"You will have a new life. I will provide you with a beginning and a light furrow for the first year. After that it will be your choices and your desires that map your lives. I give you a single life, Jack. A new beginning with something of the old intertwined. Make of it what you will and go with my blessing."

She laid a hand on each of their heads and Jack felt warmth spread through him. Every atom of his body suddenly seemed to tingle and he felt as though he was bathed in champagne. The last thing he saw before his eyes closed were the eyes of the woman, suddenly glowing a deep gold and a look of tearful joy on her face as she finally repaid her debt.

He realised that he had never asked her name.

OOOO


	2. New Day

**A/N**: Apologies but the next few chapters will be establishing the new universe that Jack and Ianto have found themselves in, so they won't be all that exciting. It'll be more scene-setting and characterisation. It will begin to pick up once that's out of the way, I promise. Well, I hope!

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter One<strong>

The first thing Jack was aware of was that he felt fine.

The second thing was that he was lying on something soft and firmly yielding, with a layer of cloth over part of his body. A bed?

The third – after an experimental movement – was that he was mostly naked.

The fourth was that he wasn't alone in bed.

Feeling a rush of hope, Jack opened his eyes and confirmed his suspicions that he was lying in a bed. The room was filled with what seemed like late afternoon light and he was lying on his side looking straight into the sleeping face of Ianto. It took a couple of seconds for him to realise that things weren't quite what he expected them to be and he pushed himself up onto his forearm, staring down at a Ianto Jones who was considerably younger than the one he was used to.

This Ianto looked to be no more than eighteen, his face smooth and open with sleep, although Jack could see signs that he was beginning to wake up. Jack could only stare down in bewilderment. Had he gone back in time? The woman had indicated that that wouldn't be happening and Jack shuddered to think of the consequences of his crossing Ianto's path so early in his timeline. Was this a Ianto from the alternate timeline? Jack's heart clenched in a second of blind panic as he wondered if his Ianto had died back in the other reality and this reality's Ianto had been substituted. He didn't _want_ another Ianto. He wanted his own, bolshy, stubborn and somewhat twisted Ianto.

Ianto's eyes fluttered open and he yawned before focusing on Jack. There was a smile on his face for all of ten seconds before complete shock took over and he was galvanised into action, pushing himself away from Jack so violently that he wound up very nearly falling out of bed. He flailed about a little before freezing and giving Jack a deer-in-the-headlights look.

"J-jack? What- where-?" His eyes widened and he brought a hand up to his throat, looking confused as he realised that his voice was subtly different.

Jack glanced down at himself, wondering what had caused that reaction, then paused when he caught sight of his hand. It was a lot more slender and less calloused than he remembered. "Ianto, do I look… younger.. to you?"

After a moment, Ianto nodded. He glanced around them and saw that there was a full-length mirror on the door of one of the wardrobes. He slid out of bed and padded across to it, closely followed by Jack. They both gazed at their reflections in stunned silence. Ianto watched as Jack took a step closer and wrapped an arm around him to run his hand across Ianto's smooth chest.

"I didn't develop the chest hair until I was about twenty," Ianto admitted, trying to suppress the instinctive reaction to Jack touching him.

His last conscious thought had been that he was dying and that he would be forever parted from Jack. Now he was fine, apparently in another reality and physically regressed to eighteen. He bit back a groan as his body continued to react to Jack and he remembered that he had been very responsive back in those days. Jack certainly seemed to approve, judging from the way he moved closer and his other hand slid around Ianto's waist and then moved lower.

Jack was revelling in something he had thought he would never be able to do again. He dropped an open-mouthed kiss on Ianto's shoulder and then bit down gently. He saw as well as heard and felt Ianto's shiver and pulled him closer for a moment before he turned the other man in his arms and kissed him properly. Ianto kissed him back with equal fervour and then he was pushing Jack back towards the bed, a plan that Jack was perfectly happy with. They ended up in a tangle of limbs on the bed, frantically needing to reaffirm that they were alive and together.

"Mark me!" Jack gasped after a moment.

Ianto paused and lifted up to look at him, his eyes gradually losing their sheen of lust. "What?"

"Mark me," Jack repeated. "She said I would be mortal. That means that if you mark me, it'll stick."

He knew that Ianto understood what he meant. Jack's immortality had also meant that he healed abnormally quickly. The cut lip that Ianto had given him during the fight over Lisa had been gone by the following day. When he broke his arm or leg he was back to normal within a week. Whenever he and Ianto made love, it didn't matter how much Ianto marked him; he would wake up the following morning with unblemished skin. It became an obsession even though he knew that there was nothing he could do about it. The idea that any mark Ianto made on his skin would now remain, a sign for all to see that he was Ianto's every bit as much as Ianto was his.

Ianto gave him a blinding smile and lowered his head to nuzzle against his throat. Jack lifted his chin, exposing the full length of his throat and gave a shuddering gasp as he felt Ianto's teeth nip and then worry against his skin, sucking and biting until the skin tingled and throbbed. Jack ran his hands down along the length of Ianto's back and grabbed at one buttock, squeezing and pulling Ianto even closer, wanting the friction of their two cocks rubbing together.

They rid themselves of their boxers with practised ease, neither wanting to let go of the other for any longer than was absolutely necessary. Jack held Ianto still long enough to claim a frantic, almost bruising kiss and then they were moving and grinding against one another as their need and hunger grew ever stronger. It didn't take long for the both of them to shudder to a physical climax and then they settled sleepily together, ever more glad than usual to be alive.

"I suppose," Ianto said around another huge yawn, "that we should be grateful she didn't decide to give us a new life from the infant stage."

Jack fell asleep in mid-laugh.

OOO

When Jack woke up again it was to find the room flooded with the bright cold light of morning. He blinked in surprise since he rarely slept an entire night except after he had been killed. Hard on the heels of that thought was another and he threw back the sheet he and Ianto had been entangled in, heading for the mirror. He was vaguely aware of Ianto's sleepy grumble but he was too busy focusing on the large hickey on his neck. One of several, he was pleased to see, turning his body this way and that to study them. There were faint marks where Ianto's blunt nails had scored across his skin and Jack hummed happily as he fingered them like precious relics.

Ianto chuckled as he followed him out of bed and came to stand just behind him. "Never thought I'd see the day when Jack Harkness got so excited about a love-bite!"

Jack whirled and grabbed him by his arms. "Don't you realise what this means, Ianto? She was telling the truth! I'm mortal! I can die!"

Ianto winced. "Well, there's no need to sound so bloody delighted about that, Jack-"

He was shut up very effectively by Jack kissing him. Since Ianto never objected to Jack kissing him – unless it was in the middle of Tesco's – he was more than happy to be silenced in that way. He moaned his approval when the initial ferocity of the kiss swiftly morphed into something more gentle and lingering but he felt a stab go through him when he saw the tears glittering in Jack's eyes when he eventually pulled away again. Even though he had come to use black humour as a shield against the pain the world had inflicted on him, it wasn't fair of him to belittle Jack's joy at being free of his curse.

"I love you," Jack blurted out.

Ianto blinked, then blinked again, his mouth opening and closing as he tried to process the words. Jack reddened and looked more worried and nervous as Ianto continued to stare at him in silence.

"I should have said that back at Thames House, but I didn't want to say it when it was too late to have any real meaning. I should have said it before then, when you weren't dying, but I was so scared that if I said it I would curse what we had." He laughed bitterly. "I should have realised that it wouldn't have made any difference. Unless you're cursed with immortality, Torchwood kills sooner rather than later."

He might have said more but Ianto put out a hand and placed it over his mouth, effectively silencing him. "It's all right, Jack, I understand. I only said it myself because I needed to hear myself say it out loud. I didn't want it to be secret and silent any more. I had nothing left to lose and I wanted you to know." He gave a small shrug. "I was never all that good with talking about my emotions. I sometimes wondered if you knew how much I cared about you."

Jack gave him a rueful grin. "Oh, I knew. It used to scare me shitless and make me want to dance with delight. Lots of people like to have sex with me but not many want to stick around in the cold light of day. Not when they learn some of the truth about me."

Ianto smiled again and ran a thumb across Jack's lips before he cupped his jaw in his hand and leaned forward for another kiss. "Never a problem with seeing you in the cold light of day, Jack," he murmured.

They stood holding one another for a little longer before coming to a mutual decision and stepping apart. Ianto glanced down at himself and wrinkled his nose.

"I think a shower is in order."

They looked around the room with more attention, taking in what was a very well-appointed bedroom. The wall opposite the bed was a built-in wardrobe and dresser in what looked like light oak. There were doors in both the left and right hand walls and when Ianto went to open the left hand one he found it opened onto a bathroom, with a large bath that could hold two people easily and an equally large shower. He smirked at the sight of that, remembering that his own shower in his flat had been too small to accommodate them comfortably, which had always annoyed Jack.

A quick rummage through the wardrobes found that some of his clothing had been sent across the dimensional void with him (and wasn't that a peculiar thought to be having!). Three of his favourite suits, about half of his ties and most of his shirts were in the wardrobe. All of his casual wear was there as well. Jack confirmed that he was finding the same thing. Deciding to go along with the flow for now, Ianto grabbed some underwear from the drawers, a pair of slacks and one of his favourite t-shirts before heading for the bathroom.

Jack soon joined him and for a moment they revelled in what was a very up-market shower. The walls of the cubicle were black granite flecked with quartz, the fixings gleaming chrome. It had all the bells and whistles that anyone could hope for and under any other circumstances Jack would have been in the mood to play with all the gadgets. Right now, however, he was still revelling in that fact that Ianto had not died and Jack had apparently been handed his deepest desire. He barely waited for Ianto to start the shower before he was crowding him back up against the tiled wall, kissing him passionately.

"I'm sure I mentioned something about getting clean," Ianto said in amusement before responding to Jack with a kiss of his own that was every bit as passionate.

They eventually switched their attention to getting clean and managed to get finished just as the water started to run tepid. There were large fluffy towels of a deep red and they dried off and then got dressed. A curious poke through the bathroom cabinets revealed what looked like the contents of those in Ianto's bathroom back on Earth. Jack nodded thoughtfully.

"I guess she wanted to ease us into things so it makes sense to have some familiar things around us."

Ianto shook his head a little helplessly and sank down to sit on the toilet seat. "This is just so weird," he confessed. "I keep forgetting and then it suddenly slaps me in the face that just a few hours ago I was dying on the floor of Thames House and now I'm in another reality and on some alien world." He grinned up at Jack ruefully. "You must be used to this kind of thing."

Jack shrugged. "A bit," he agreed, "but every time it happened before I was in the same universe. This place will be as alien to me as it is to you."

"I'm not sure if that's reassuring or terrifying," Ianto mused. He paused and in the silence the sound of his stomach growling could clearly be heard. Jack laughed and Ianto flicked a towel at him in mock-annoyance. "Hush, you. Well, I suppose we'd better start exploring and seeing where we are."

They left the bedroom via the other door and walked down a short corridor which opened out onto a large open plan living room. Ianto gasped and heard Jack give a soft whistle of appreciation as he took in the space and the floor-to-ceiling windows that took up most of the external wall space. They could only see open sky from where they were standing so it was certain they were fairly high up. There was a free-standing fireplace at one end with a comfortable looking seating arrangement around it. On the other side of the huge room was a dining table and chairs. There were other pieces of furniture placed around the room and Ianto's eyes widened when he saw pieces he had owned.

They were drawn to the windows and were treated to a view that took their breath away. The building they were in was on the waterfront and the view from the windows was over a bay which extended out into the distance, where a headland curved around to block their view of the horizon. After a moment, Ianto started to frown.

"Jack-"

"It's Cardiff Bay," Jack said, pre-empting Ianto's suspicions. "That's Penarth, over there."

"The church is missing," Ianto observed. "It could be a coincidence. I mean, one headland can look very like another-"

"I've looked out over this view for a hundred years, Ianto," Jack said quietly. "The buildings are different but the landscape is the same."

Ianto nodded, accepting what Jack said. "So we're in an alternate Cardiff?" he asked tentatively.

"Looks like it.," Jack agreed. "But that can wait for the moment. You're not the only one who's hungry!"

They discovered the kitchen on the opposite end of the room. It was a nice balance of modern and traditional, all warm wood and cool tile, with dark slate flooring. It had a utility room off the main room but Jack and Ianto were more interested in locating some food. The fridge was one of those big American models that contained enough food to feed most of Cardiff and the cupboards next to it contained basic foodstuffs.

"It seems our friend is a bit of a health nut," Ianto observed with mild discontent when he realised that the place was stocked with healthy food options.

Jack gave a snort of laughter as he pulled out some fruit and a glass bottle of milk. "You'll have to put aside your principles and eat something healthy for a change," he observed as he also snagged the box of muesli and deposited them on the breakfast bar before going to look for a couple of bowls.

"There's nothing wrong with cold pizza or curry for breakfast," Ianto said with affronted dignity, then grinned in spite of himself at the raspberry that earned him from Jack.

They eventually sat down to a larger and more leisurely breakfast than Ianto was used to, the fruit-topped muesli followed by thick-sliced toast – wholemeal, Ianto noted with annoyance – slathered with butter and marmalade. To both their delight, there was freshly ground coffee and a cafetiere, which made their breakfast complete.

"Now what do we do?" Ianto asked once they had cleared up after themselves.

"Keep exploring, I guess," Jack decided.

The apartment turned out to be the penthouse and contained another bedroom and en-suite bathroom, a library and a room set up as a shared office. Jack glanced around at the two desks and then paused as he saw that there was a large leather file on each desk. A closer look revealed that the name _Jack Harkness_ had been embossed in silver on the dark blue leather of one while _Ianto Jones_ was inscribed in gold on the deep red one. He called Ianto back and went over to pick up the one with his name on it. As soon as he opened it and saw what was inside, he smiled in appreciation.

"She's thorough," he commented, as he looked down at what was obviously a birth certificate. "I think this is the information we need to start our new life."

He saw that he had apparently been born on the 27th November, 2403 in Glasgow. He raised his eyebrows at that, wondering if it was a coincidence that it was the place that had housed Torchwood Two. He flicked quickly through the rest of the file and saw that it had things like family background, academic history, financial statements… His eyes widened when he saw the total in his bank account. Unless this version of Wales was suffering from galloping inflation, he was more than comfortably well off. He glanced across at Ianto, who was looking just as intrigued. "You okay?"

Ianto nodded. "She's kept my birthday as 28th August but the year is 2403."

"Same as me," Jack observed happily. He looked across at the desk and saw a calendar. "It's 7th May, 2422. We are eighteen. She meant it when she said we'd get a new life."

"Such a strange feeling," Ianto murmured. "I can hardly remember what it felt like when I was eighteen."

"And you don't have to," Jack pointed out. "This is a new start. We don't need to hold on to the past unless we want to."

They both paused when they heard what sounded like a doorbell. Exchanging tense looks, they backtracked through the apartment until they got to the entrance. As they hesitated, the doorbell went again. Taking a deep breath, Jack went to answer it, pausing briefly when he saw that there was a post-it at eye-level.

_Her name is Dana. Her father's name is Sam. He suffers from allergies at this time of year._

Opening the door, Jack found himself facing a young woman who was holding what looked like some letters. "Hi, Dana," he said.

She gave him a cheerful grin. "Hiya, Jack. Hope I'm not too early. I know the two of you got in late last night but I figured you'd want your post since it has the letters from the University!"

He took his cue from her excitement as he accepted the small sheaf of letters. "Great, we've been waiting for those. How are your Dad's allergies?"

She pulled a face. "Playing up like hell. I think I've just about persuaded him to go and get tested for the new treatment but we'll have to see. I'd better get the rest of the post distributed. Take care!"

She bounced off towards a lift and Jack closed the door, looking down at the letters thoughtfully. Two were a deep rich cream and in the top left hand corner was a coat of arms and the delicate calligraphy reading _Cardiff University of Cymru_. There was one apiece. "I have a feeling we're going to be going to university," he said.

Ianto had been studying the post-it but he gave Jack a wide-eyed look of surprise at that and grabbed the letter Jack handed him. He opened it quickly, and much more sloppily than he would have normally and quickly scanned the letter inside. "I'll be damned," he said in wonder. "It's confirmation that I've been accepted to study Information and Communications Technology and Archival Systems. That's going to be interesting."

"I'm down for Engineering," Jack said in amusement. "Actually, that makes a lot of sense. Engineering is engineering whether you're in the past, the present or the future. I'll be able to adapt pretty fast."

"It'll feel weird going to university," Ianto said.

"If you think it's weird for you, then imagine how I'm going to feel!" Jack said in amusement. He folded the letter back up and put it back inside the envelope. "Come on, let's go out and explore. I want to see how this Cardiff differs from the one we knew."

They found coats hanging up next to the entrance. To Ianto's annoyance, there was no sign of Jack's coat but Jack just shrugged and put on the leather jacket that held a wallet with cards bearing his name along with a respectable amount of money.

"It might be difficult to explain why I'm wearing a coat with the insignia and rank markings from the Royal Air Force if that doesn't exist," he pointed out.

"I suppose so," Ianto said, although there was still a discontented note in his voice. He reached for the denim jacket and found that it had his wallet in one of the pockets. "Shall we go?"

Jack confirmed that the keys he and Ianto were carrying were for the front door and he nodded. "Let's go exploring."

OOO


	3. New World

They paused outside the building and looked back up. It was the largest building in the immediate area and was elliptical in shape and twenty-one storeys high. There were a couple of other buildings nearby, identical in shape but only fifteen stories high. The outside of each building was faced with mosaic tiles that formed abstract patterns in blue, green and white.

"Huh, there are balconies," Jack noted, seeing the sweep of metal that followed the curve of the building. At the widest point of the ellipse the balcony expanded and Jack made a mental note to check that out when they got back.

"Is it me or does the air taste different?" Ianto asked.

Jack breathed in a few times. "Less petrochemicals," he said eventually. "Fewer cars maybe?"

"Or maybe more efficient," Ianto agreed as he nodded to where some traffic was moving along the road.

There was less traffic than Ianto had been expecting. At first he thought that this was because they were away from the main area of the city but even as they approached the Bay there were fewer cars than he would have seen if he had been walking this route in his old Cardiff. The cars they did see didn't differ all that much from the ones he was already familiar with, except that there was a slightly retro feel to the designs. There was the usual mixture, even if the numbers were down, with sporty models mixed in with more practical, work or family-orientated designs. The buses definitely looked like models he had seen in period TV programmes, all curves and shiny metal as well as cheerful paint jobs. Engine noise seemed muted, more like a purr or hum than a roar and he wondered what kind of engine was under those bonnets.

Colour seemed to be everywhere, as well as a passion for curves. Buildings were either oval or round. Those buildings that did have a straight line to them invariably had some kind of round tower or cupola to them, as if the designer had gritted their teeth to make a square box and had then regretted it and tried to make amends by adding a curve or two. Every building looked like a minor work of art, albeit with some of the older ones looking a bit scuffed around the edges. Either they had a mosaic facing like the building that Jack and Ianto were now living in or the building had been painted or constructed out of natural materials that acquired a patina with age.

"Looks good," Jack commented as they looked around, taking in the frequent patches of greenery and the trees planted along the way.

"Looks aren't everything," Ianto said.

Jack gave a snort of laughter. "Pessimist."

"Optimist," Ianto shot back and they shared a mutual laugh.

There might have been less traffic than they were used to but there were plenty of pedestrians. Ianto studied the people with interest, looking for differences that would tell him he was in another world. The racial mix was pretty much the same as he was used to and the area they were in seemed to be one occupied by families and young professionals. The biggest and most obvious difference was in the clothing, which wasn't that big a surprise, given the way fashion always reflected society.

Once again there was more colour. Even people who were walking briskly along in what he assumed to be working clothes eschewed the black or dark grey that would have been the norm on his Earth. Even the men wore suits of rich blue, plum or dark red. Ianto eyed an example in the latter colour and mentally teamed it with a black shirt and silk tie of old gold, then shook his head. He was an eighteen year old with a place in university. It would be a while before he needed to wear a suit again. For a moment he felt panic touch him; the suits had been his armour against the world for some time and he felt naked and vulnerable without them.

Jack seemed to pick up on his sudden uncertainty and nudged him gently. "You okay?"

Ianto gave a nervous laugh. "More or less. I guess I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop and the monster to jump out of the undergrowth."

"If it does, we'll deal with it," Jack said with supreme confidence and Ianto felt a warmth blossom inside at the unconscious 'we'.

They got to the Bay after half an hour's walk and they looked around curiously. The Deep Basin was still there and there was a sailing ship tied up alongside which seemed to be a tourist attraction judging from the number of people getting on an off it. There was no sign of the Millennium Centre but there was one large building that looked vaguely Romanesque which dominated the area. When they wandered over they found that it was called the International Trade Centre. Since people seemed to be going in and out without any kind of checks being done, they ventured inside and found the interior filled with light, courtesy of the huge windows that dominated the atrium. A directory was positioned helpfully just inside the main entrance and Jack ran his gaze down the listings and started to get a feel for this new world of theirs.

"Celtic Nations?" Ianto murmured next to him. "No mention of the United States or the EEU. Confederation of Lemuria? Aegean Alliance? We are most definitely not in Kansas any more!"

Jack hummed agreement. "Let's hope they have something like the internet otherwise we're going to have to find a library."

Ianto gave him a mock glare. "I'll be finding a library anyway, thank you. University, remember? Not all of us have the advantage of coming from the 51st century."

Jack shot him a rueful smile as they exited the building and went back out into the cool sunny day. "Oddly enough, that isn't much of an advantage. Technology in the 51st century was so unobtrusive that you never even registered it most of the time. Quite a few people lived their entire lives without having to do the equivalent of changing a light bulb or fixing a fuse. That was the biggest culture shock for me when I started to travel through time. Even though I came from a colony world and what we had was pretty basic, I hadn't really considered machines as being something you had to _fix_."

Ianto blinked as he considered that. It would explain how someone as advanced as Jack sometimes seemed to have so much trouble with something as simple as a microwave or computer. "A keyboard? How quaint?" he offered after a moment.

Jack snorted a laugh. "Yeah, actually. Still remember my shock at seeing how big and clumsy computers were when they were finally invented. Where shall we go next?"

Accepting that Jack had reached his comfort limit where revealing something of his past was concerned, Ianto looked around and noticed that the area had quite a high number of cafes, restaurants and small shops, very like Mermaid Quay had had. "Let's just walk around and get a feel for things," he suggested.

Jack was happy enough to agree to that and as they made a slow circle around the immediate area, Ianto found his thoughts sliding back to the subject of Jack telling people about his past. He'd always been reluctant to do so; Ianto got the distinct impression that even the Doctor hadn't been privy to any great reveals but had had the advantage of having access to far better sources of information than anyone else. Ianto sometimes wondered why it was that he never felt the frustration that Gwen did when Jack clammed up, but he supposed it was because he wasn't really interested in how Jack had been in the past. Jack had mentioned that he was ashamed of how he had been and what he had done and that he was looking to somehow compensate for that by being a better person in the present. Ianto could understand that and since he had fallen in love with the Jack of 'now' he wasn't even certain he wanted to find out all that much about the Jack of 'then'.

"You know, since we're in a whole new world and we've been given new identities and backgrounds, it would be sensible for us to focus on the new rather than the old," he said with careful carelessness. "I don't mean forget the people who meant something to us but we need to focus on who we're going to be now." There was a long pause during which Ianto was careful not to look in Jack, focusing instead on the window of a bakery which had a wide selection of bread and cakes to tempt the passer-by.

Jack was struggling with the wave of emotion that threatened to overwhelm him. So many of his previous lovers had wanted to 'know' him, ignoring his desire to leave his past behind and demanding answers to questions he didn't want to even think about, let alone answer. Ianto was still curious and loved to hear the stories Jack was willing to tell, but he was the first to really respect the line Jack had drawn between who he was now and who had been then. As soon as he realised Jack was unwilling to go into details he backed off and changed the subject. Now he was offering Jack an even bigger prize: the chance to break completely with the past and move forward.

No-one apart from Ianto knew him in this reality. There was no paper trail, no old photographs, no people who had known him in the past. There was no Doctor to breeze in and out of his life, always faintly disapproving and just that little bit too forced in the way he smiled at Jack. There was no chance of old friends or – as was more likely – enemies coming to find him. He could start afresh and the only person who knew him as anything or anyone different was telling him that he would go along with it. It was a dizzying thought.

"There are times when I just want to grab you and kiss you senseless and never let you go, you know that?" he eventually said. He looked across to where Ianto was so very carefully not looking at him, not placing any pressure on him. "This is one of those times."

Ianto shot him one of those shy, pleased looks that made Jack feel ten feet tall and invincible in a way that had nothing to do with being immortal. He grinned back and lamented that he couldn't do what he wanted and just sweep Ianto into his arms but he knew that would embarrass Ianto terribly. Instead he looked past the other man to the window Ianto had been looking into.

"Oooh, cakes!" he exclaimed brightly.

The laugh that earned him from Ianto held a distinct note of relief and Jack congratulated himself on getting it right. "Lots of different kinds of cake," Ianto agreed. "Maybe we can buy some to take back to the flat? Something to balance out all that healthiness in the larder?"

"Sounds like a plan," Jack agreed enthusiastically.

They entered the bakery and inhaled the delicious aromas of bread and cakes. There was a small queue waiting to be served so the two of them whiled away the time by choosing which cakes they were going to have. Or, in Jack's case, which ones he could be persuaded _not_ to buy. With a grin of pure mischief, Ianto leaned in close.

"Just remember you're not immortal any more, Jack. If you gain weight, you'll have to lose it the old-fashioned way."

Jack tried to give him an affronted look but the words 'not immortal any more' meant he couldn't keep the grin off his face. "You won't love me if I get some love-handles, Mr Jones?" he asked with a pout.

Ianto grinned back. "Fishing for compliments, Captain Harkness?"

"Mister," Jack said softly. "No more Captain."

Ianto rolled his eyes and shook his head. "You'll always be my Captain, Jack." He paused and pulled a face. "Can't believe how unbelievably mushy that sounded."

"I like mushy," Jack decided. "Oooh, chocolate _fudge_!" he yelped in excitement as another cake caught his eye.

Ianto snorted a laugh at the sight of his lover's open exuberance. Was this a result of Jack shedding the curse of immortality or was it a side-effect of knowing that he was free of all the responsibilities that had been weighing him down before? The deaths of Tosh and Owen and the revelation of Gray's insanity had hit Jack hard, despite his determination to carry on and help Ianto and Gwen come to terms with their grief. In hindsight, Ianto realised that Jack's apparent withdrawal from their relationship had been a self-defence mechanism and an effort to stave off the inevitable grief he would feel when he lost Ianto.

Now all that was behind them. The tainted chalice of Torchwood, with its mixture of delight and torment. The responsibility of living up to the impossible standards the Doctor set. The knowledge for Jack that every person he brought into Torchwood automatically started living on the edge and courted death. The knowledge for Ianto that he had made a mess of his personal life and could never ever have anything even remotely resembling a normal life. They had a second chance.

Ianto realised that he was scared to death and that was one hell of an epiphany to have just as the girl behind the counter wanted to know what kind of cake he was interested in.

They left with two carrier bags of cake and bread and a clearer grasp of the currency. The girl had picked up on Jack's accent and had assumed him to be a tourist and since they had been the last customers before a lull she had helpfully explained the different notes and coins. It was still a decimal system but with different names for the coins.

"You have the notes, of course, but they have the numbers to tell you what denomination they are," she said as she spread the different notes out. They didn't have the face of the Queen and the historical personalities of Ianto's reality but the body of each note was filled with intricate Celtic patterns of different colours as well as a gold or silver sitting dragon and the number of the note.

She took them through the coins, which were pretty much as Ianto and Jack were used to, although the twenty pence piece was a twenty five pence piece and the two pound coin was called a florin. The fifty pence piece was also triangular. Jack hammed up the 'helpless tourist' routine and has the girl blushing and giggling while Ianto watched with amusement.

"How long are you here for?" she asked once she had taken the correct money and started to pack away their purchases.

"I live here," Jack said. "I was born in Glasgow."

"But you sound like you come from Lemuria or maybe Hesperis," she objected.

"My parents went to live there for a while and I picked up the accent," Jack said quickly, "but I got a place in Cardiff University and came to live here."

She grinned. "Good choice, but then I'm biased. Enjoy the cakes!"

"Oh, I will," Jack informed her.

"If I'm lucky I'll get the odd crumb," Ianto added dryly and grinned as Jack and the girl both laughed. "The sad thing is," he continued once they had left the shop, "that she thinks I'm joking!"

Jack made a rude sound. "As if I'd dare to touch the lemon cream cake you picked out. Did you catch what she said about Lemuria?"

"Yes. The Trade Centre had a listing for the Confederation of Lemuria but I don't remember seeing anything about anywhere called Hesperis."

"Wonder if it has anything to do with our Hesperides?" Jack mused as he made a beeline for what looked like a café.

"Hmm, they were the gardens to the west of the world. Maybe the west coast of America? If the accent is the same," Ianto added.

"We have got to do some research," Jack agreed, "but first I can smell coffee!"

"With your nose for coffee that could mean it was being brewed in Scotland," Ianto observed dryly.

He was happy enough to follow Jack inside what turned out to be a very cosy café that specialised in all kinds of coffees, teas and what seemed to be fruit wines and ciders. It was reasonably full of a wide mix of people who were sitting around drinking, chatting and either reading or using what looked like hand-helds. What held Ianto's attention and had him rooted to the spot, however, was the sight of two young men who were seated close to the window and who were kissing one another enthusiastically. None of the crowd were paying them the slightest attention.

"What would you like?" the young man behind the counter asked.

Brought back with a jolt, Ianto hastily looked up at the extensive list on the wall behind the counter. He felt a small frisson of panic when he realised that hardly any of the names there were familiar to him and he knew that a normal person would know what kind of coffee or tea they wanted to drink. His gaze alighted on a tin left out on the counter which had the words 'House Blend' written on the label and he seized the option.

"Can I try the house blend?"

The barista smiled. "No problem. With or without milk or cream, or would you like the option tray?"

"Um, option, I think," Ianto decided, then breathed a sigh of relief when the other man seemed to accept that without any qualms.

The option tray, it turned out, was a tray with his mug of coffee, black, and small jugs of milk and cream and equally tiny bowls filled with brown and white sugar plus another with honey. Jack had ordered what looked like a wine of some kind.

"Dandelion wine," Jack said when he saw Ianto looking. "I haven't tasted that since the war."

Ianto shook his head. "It's strange how the little things can be just as startling as the big ones." He paused to taste the coffee and found it had a decent if unadventurous flavour. A good blend to serve to a general audience when you didn't know their preferences. He saw Jack's curious look and smiled. "It's good. Bit bland but well-roasted and made."

"Coming from you, that's quite the compliment," Jack commented as he sipped at the wine. "Oh, that's nice. Just the right side of sweet. It'd be good with a pastry," he decided, eyeing the menu.

"You and your food," Ianto said fondly. He hesitated, then inclined his head very slightly towards the couple who had attracted his attention before. "Did you see-?"

Jack nodded. "Not sure if it's a local tolerance or a general one but we can find out," he said. He flashed Ianto a smile. "It would be nice if it was general."

Ianto nodded, knowing that Jack had often got frustrated with the attitudes of the 21st century. He sometimes wondered how on Earth Jack had coped during the 19th but knew better than to ask. After a moment he reached out and brushed his hand along the top of Jack's, throttling back his instinctive reflex to pull back as soon as he had done it. The warmth in Jack's eyes as he lifted his gaze from their hands to meet Ianto's gaze was reward enough but he also felt a small thrill at the way the woman in the table just across from them looked up in their direction but was obviously more interested in the people passing by through the front window than the fact they were almost holding hands.

After a moment Jack lifted his hand away and started to fiddle with his wristband. Ianto blinked, realising that he was so used to seeing that on Jack's wrist that he hadn't registered that it had come across the dimensions along with everything else. After a while there was a soft beeping sound and Jack pulled in a breath before dropping his hands back on to the table.

"There's no Rift," he said flatly.

Ianto blinked and for a moment the words made no sense. It was as if Jack had said 'there's no Sun' or 'there's no gravity'. The Rift might have only had a direct impact on Ianto's life for a few years but they had been such intense years that they tended to overshadow everything else that had ever happened to him. While he had intellectually considered the possibility, having Jack say it out loud, and in the kind of tone of voice that implied a dead certainty, was more than a little disconcerting.

"No Rift," he echoed, trying out the words like they were in a foreign language. "So no equivalent of Torchwood?"

Jack shrugged and took another sip of wine. "Would there be a reason to have a Torchwood if there was no Rift?" he asked. "Does this reality have the equivalent of the Doctor and did he annoy the equivalent of Queen Victoria so she created Torchwood? Has this Earth been invaded by aliens?"

Ianto nodded and finished his coffee quickly. "We need to do some serious research," he said, "and if there's one thing I'm good at, it's research."

Jack laughed as he tossed back the rest of the wine and rose from the table the same time as Ianto did. "Oh, Jones, Ianto Jones, there's far more than one thing that you are good at!"

OOO


	4. Finding One's Feet

A/N: This should be the last chapter with background stuff. From now on it will be story. Thank you for your patience and for all the lovely reviews.

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><p><strong>Finding One's Feet<strong>

By the end of three weeks they had a much better idea of the kind of world they had come to. Broadly speaking it was a lot like their own Earth but there were significant differences. Some of these were geo-political and some cultural and the two of them focused on the ones that would be likely to trip them up immediately while making a note of the others that they would need to be aware of before they started university in September.

Britain had been united until roughly seventy-five years ago when the Celtic Nations had seceded and formed their own alliance and England had concentrated on its Commonwealth. Ianto discovered that Cardiff wasn't the capital of Wales in this reality; that was a place called Hafan, which was where Milford Haven was in his old world. Cardiff was considered the second city of Wales and famous for its culture and university.

There was a World Council which seemed to be a bit like the United Nations but with real power and teeth. There was a flourishing space race which seemed to be taking the place of an arms race for most of the power factions. Mankind had several bases on the Moon, space stations right out of a pulp fiction writer's dreams and there had been manned missions to Mars and Venus. There was even a small but growing tourist industry on the Moon.

A little to their relief, this wasn't a perfect world, free from all the ills that had plagued their old one. Some things were better: same sex relationships being the most obvious in that most places considered them to be on a par with hetero relationships, but there were still problems with racism. There was crime of all kinds. A quick trawl had turned up the usual mixture of crimes and misdemeanours and there was something infinitely reassuring in the knowledge that they weren't living with some kind of purified form of humanity.

The biggest difference, however, lay in the fact that this world was perfectly aware that there were aliens out there.

"Jack?" Ianto looked up from his trawling through cyberspace. "You ever come across a race called the Dhmeii?"

Jack sat up from where he was lounging on the sofa watching TV and gave him a curious look. "It sounds vaguely familiar." He wracked his brain for a minute. "I think they were an extinct race. Nice people but their world went up in flames when their sun went nova. Why?"

Ianto leaned back in his seat and gazed at the computer screen. "Because it looks like they got away in this reality and they wound up here." He saw Jack start to get up and shook his head. "Hang on, I can stream my connection to the TV."

He stroked a few keys and the TV screen blanked before it displayed the webpage that Ianto was currently on. Jack swiftly scanned the contents before he gave a soft whistle. "I'll be damned. Score one to the Humans on this side of the dimensional barrier!"

Ianto nodded in agreement. The Dhmeii had turned up in the Sol system, their entire race and ecology represented by three gigantic space arks that had been damaged when they had encountered an inimical alien race. Their ships had limped into Earth orbit, throwing the human race into a startled panic before it had been established that the Dhmeii were utterly peaceful, despite their ferocious appearance. The initial cautious communications had slowly become more open and friendly, especially when Humanity had realised that most of Earth was far too cold for the Dhmeii. Having evolved on a much hotter planet, only the equatorial region was bearable to them.

Humans had relaxed even further when they realised that the only thing the Dhmeii were asking for was the right to visit the surface of the Earth for short trips to acclimatise their ship-born children to a natural gravity field while they used their technology to mine asteroids and a comet or two for the raw materials to repair their vessels. By the end of the first year, Humanity had adjusted to the fact that they weren't the only intelligent lifeforms in the universe and they had greedily absorbed all the information the Dhmeii had freely offered. Although there had been problems from some quarters, Humanity had by and large come to like the lizard-like Dhmeii.

"I have a nasty feeling we wouldn't have been so accepting on our world," Ianto sighed as he scanned the list of various articles, books and TV items which charted the rapid acceptance of the aliens.

"This Earth has a stronger history of trading links forging alliances and bringing races closer together," Jack pointed out. "They've had fewer military empires and more trading ones. People have grown used to looking for similarities rather than differences." He grinned. "Besides, the Dhmeii had some really cool toys and Humans wanted to play."

Ianto laughed softly. While Humans had been successfully exploring their solar system, the Dhmeii had far more efficient technology that made star travel feasible and once Humanity realised that, they had very much wanted to know how to build such ships.

"I can't believe the Dhmeii just offered the technology to us," Ianto said in wonderment.

Jack shrugged. "Alien minds. They didn't see it as something they should profit from and Humans had been kind and welcoming after the previous race had tried to kill and eat them. They wanted to give something back."

"And didn't that put the cat amongst the pigeons," Ianto said in amusement.

Presented with such a gift, Humanity had suffered an attack of conscience. The Dhmeii had made it clear that they were hunting for a new home but had been unable to find one that wasn't already inhabited. They were planning to set off again once they had repaired their arks but the odds on them being successful were small. Some humans had already commented that Venus, which had been found to be disappointingly lifeless, was perfect from a temperature point of view but would need to be terraformed. They had been largely ignored up until that point but when the Dhmeii had given Humanity the secret of their propulsion system, along with several other technological breakthroughs, far more powerful voices had raised the concept of gifting them Venus in return. There had been some serious discussions – and arguments – but the voices for the motion had been carried. It had taken a hundred years, but Venus was now officially Anahi Medhri and Humanity was happily building three ships that could travel to the outer planets of the solar system and beyond.

"So even if Torchwood did exist here we wouldn't have to worry about people finding out about the aliens," Ianto observed later on that afternoon as he took his turn to prepare a meal.

"Yeah, but they also know it's not all peace and love out there," Jack pointed out as he got together the cutlery and glassware. "The Dhmeii knew of six alien races. Two were friendly, one was ambivalent, two were so alien there was no area for interaction and one was profoundly hostile. That's why the World Council decided to form the Space Force. And stop grinning!" he said in exasperation.

"How did you know I was grinning?" Ianto asked as he turned around to show that he was doing just that.

"Because you always do when you hear the words 'Space Force'," Jack said.

Ianto's grin broadened. "Oh, come on, it sounds so damn Buck Rogers or Dan Dare!" He adopted a wide-legged stance with his fists jammed against his hips. "Join the Space Force for a life of adventure!" he intoned dramatically.

Jack snorted a laugh. "Stop it," he said in mock severity. "You never know: that might be our future career!"

Ianto sobered and looked thoughtful. "You're right. I hadn't thought of that." After a moment he shivered. "It still feels weird, knowing that I have an entire life ahead of me and I can do what I want." After a moment, he shrugged and gave Jack a grin. "Still, that's in the future and I have to get through university first. Are we eating outside?"

Jack nodded. "I thought we'd take advantage of the fact it's still sunny. Why is this version of Cardiff so sunny?"

Ianto rolled his eyes. "Our version was sunny enough. You just never got out of the Hub enough during the day."

Jack nodded thoughtfully but didn't say anything as he went to lay the table for their meal. They'd discovered that the balcony that went completely around their building opened out into a wider space at both ends of the long axis. The one next to the kitchen had raised beds with a small fruit and herb garden, along with some vegetables. It had been a long time since Jack had had anything to do with gardening but he was enjoying taking care of this one, and the flower garden on the opposite end had a built-in barbeque that he was looking forward to using.

In the past three weeks he had seen Ianto lose a lot of his stiff reserve and careful self-control. It was almost as if he was remembering what it was to be young and Jack was thoroughly enchanted with the result. Jack was self-aware enough to realise that he was also changing, shedding his defensive instincts and relaxing more. It was still a joy to wake up in the morning to find himself tangled up with Ianto and know that they could take their time before they got up. There were no Rift alerts, no mounds of paperwork, no endless arguments with petty bureaucrats and hostile rival organisations. There was no fear that the next person who came calling for revenge would succeed in killing Ianto. There was no Doctor to imply that Jack was a disappointment. Jack could – and did - still feel guilt or remorse about past actions but now he had a clean slate and he was determined to make a success of this life and to leave a legacy that he could be unequivocally be proud of.

Of course there was a solid chance that he would also be climbing the walls with boredom in six months, but he was determined to be optimistic.

No matter what might happen, he had Ianto and that, he was happy to admit, made one hell of a difference. He'd always been afraid to commit to Ianto completely; partly because he knew he had a lousy track record when it came to maintaining a serious relationship but also because he had known that the deeper he let Ianto get under his skin the worse it was going to be when Ianto inevitably died. Of course Ianto had managed to worm his way through all of Jack's defensive layers without even realising he was doing it and when Jack had realised how important Ianto had become to him he had panicked and done his best to push the younger man away. He went cold as he thought how he had felt when Ianto had been dying in his arms and he had realised that the effort had been for nothing because his heart had been shattering with every gasping breath Ianto had taken.

The man in question appeared and set down the plates with their pasta lunch, adding a basket of bread rolls. He went back to get the sparkling water they usually drank with their lunch, a habit of Jack's that had rubbed off on Ianto. Jack gave a mischievous grin as he realised that Ianto had only used mushrooms and onions with the ham in the pasta.

"Someone's going to be getting salad with his dinner," he teased with a grin and then laughed as Ianto stuck his tongue out at him.

"Mushrooms and onions are vegetables," Ianto said firmly. The ongoing battle between himself and Jack over what constituted a healthy diet was a familiar one but Ianto wasn't one to give in easily. He loved any kind of fruit but he balked at eating endless quantities of vegetables.

Jack just gave him a grin that promised the other man was up to no good and Ianto had a feeling there was some kind of broccoli surprise in his near future. He switched his attention to eating and for a while there was a comfortable silence as the two of them demolished their lunch.

"Any plans for this evening?" Jack asked once the main meal had been cleared away and Ianto had brought out the fresh peaches and cream he'd put together for dessert.

Ianto shrugged. "I thought we might check out that new club on the Parade," he suggested. "Or maybe swing by the _Lion_. Dorcas is singing tonight."

Jack considered the options. They'd started to socialise, tentatively at first but with more confidence as they had met and made casual friends. The _Golden Lion_ was a pub on the Bay which had been around since the 1700s and it had been left alone by developers and designers so it still retained a lot of its original features. It had always been popular with the more bohemian members of Cardiff's population and that tradition was still going strong.

Jack was enjoying having the time to just kick back and savour life again. His forays into the Cardiff social scene in the old dimension had been largely trawling expeditions for sexual partners before he had gone off with the Doctor. After he had returned from the Year That Never Was he had been more interested in getting to know Ianto properly so there had been more trips to the theatre and cinema, more meals in restaurants, but they had often had their dates interrupted by work. That wasn't happening now. He and Ianto could go out for a leisurely meal and know that they could spend as long as they liked before moving on to a club or theatre.

"Let's go to the _Lion_," Jack decided. "Dorcas is always a fun gig."

Ianto gave him an old-fashioned look. "No," he said flatly.

Jack made a valiant attempt to look innocent. "What?"

"I was drunk, you encouraged me and I am never doing it again."

Jack gave up on trying to pretend ignorance and burst into a peal of laughter. The second time they had gone to the _Lion_, Ianto had had a bit too much to drink. When the Lion's resident chanteuse, Dorcas, had invited people to come up and do a mini-session, Ianto had got up, borrowed a guitar and did a belting version of Queen's _Let Me Entertain You_ that had gone down a storm. He'd then gone on to sing several other songs before dragging Jack up on stage so they could perform _You're the One That I Want_. Ianto had nearly died of embarrassment the following day.

"Come on," Jack coaxed. "You had them screaming for more."

"I made a complete idiot of myself," Ianto corrected. "Dorcas thought I'd written all those songs. I nearly had a heart attack when she asked if she could sing them as well."

"Well no-one's likely to come after us for copyright infringement, are they?" Jack pointed out reasonably. He grinned again. "We could make a fortune writing all manner of books, poems and songs and screenplays-"

"That would be immoral!" Ianto said in exasperation. "Besides, it's not like we're desperate for money, is it?"

Jack had to concede that. Both he and Ianto had discovered that they were independently wealthy. Ianto had a property portfolio which included the building they lived in, as well as shares in a chain of coffee houses. Jack had supposedly inherited his grandfather's personal fortune as well as the controlling interest in a flourishing trading company. Between the two of them they had enough money that they didn't really need to have any kind of job, although the two of them knew that a life of idle luxury would have them climbing the walls in short order.

"I was thinking more along the lines of bringing culture to the masses," Jack said instead.

"And the air of virtue would work _so_ much better if I didn't know you, Jack Harkness," Ianto retorted.

Jack laughed and shrugged. "It was worth a try, but think how deprived these people are that they don't know about James Bond," he pointed out mischievously.

Ianto smirked. "Nice try, Captain, but it ain't going to work. This world has its own cultural icons and I rather fancy Gideon Locke."

"Such a fickle creature," Jack said mournfully before placing a kiss on the tip of Ianto's nose.

That led to more kisses and the kisses led to even more pleasurable pursuits so it was a while before they left the flat and made their way over to the Bay. It was busy in the late afternoon sunshine and Jack and Ianto amused themselves with a little bit of window shopping before they made their way to the _Lion_. After the warm May afternoon sunshine it was cool and dim inside, the smattering of customers making a hum of conversation and laughter. Dorcas soon appeared and greeted the two of them warmly, her green eyes a vivid contrast to her warm golden skin and jet black hair done up in an elaborate chignon.

"Going to sing for us tonight, little blackbird?" she asked Ianto with a mischievous smile.

"I am never getting drunk in this place again," Ianto said fervently, flipping Jack the finger as the other man laughed. "Usual?" he asked over his shoulder and went off to the bar when Jack nodded.

"Ah, the world is a poorer place when blackbirds don't sing," Dorcas said mournfully. She gave Jack a severe look. "It is your duty to make him want to sing."

"Oh, he does sing," Jack said with a smirk, "but it's almost always a private performance."

"Selfish, that's your problem," Dorcas said with a snort. "Still, I've had wonderful responses to the songs that he gifted me with. I've been the envy of many another singer in the city." She smiled impishly. "Lots of them are trying to find out who the songwriter is and I am having so much fun being mysterious!"

Ianto gave them both a deeply suspicious look as he returned with the drinks to find them laughing. He said nothing, though, handing Jack his wheat beer and Dorcas a glass of brandy. "Do I want to know?" he demanded.

"Probably," Jack said with a smirk.

"But we're not going to tell you," Dorcas added and gave a peal of laughter as Ianto muttered something uncomplimentary under his breath.

She drifted away to speak to some of the other regulars and Jack and Ianto took their drinks out into the small garden that rang alongside the _Lion_ and which gave a good view of the Bay and part of the docks. These were still busy and they enjoyed watching the boats sail up to be offloaded of their cargo. Many ships were equipped with the solar sails that made them look like the old sailing ships of the past and it was a beautiful sight as the sun slowly sank and painted everything a rich deep antique gold.

By the time night fell and the entertainment started, Ianto was feeling a pleasant buzz and Jack was mellow. They moved back indoors and ordered some food, knowing from previous experience that the _Lion_ kept a good table. There was more of a crowd by now and both of them cast a wary eye in the direction of one table, the occupants of which were just that little bit too rowdy for this early in the evening. Fights in the _Lion_ were rare, since the owner was ex-Army and had employed a couple of his old colleagues, but they did happen.

Dorcas took her place on the small stage at the far end of the main room and the crowd quietened in anticipation. She had one of those voices that Jack had heard described as 'smoky'. She had a knack of wrapping that voice around the lyrics of her songs and making it sound as if she was purring them into the ear of each and every single person listening to her. She was a chanteuse of the old school, so far as Jack was concerned, happier with a small appreciative live audience than she would be making records and touring large theatres and concert halls. She knew her strengths and worked with them and the result was that both she and her audiences were happy.

As was her usual habit, when she had sung several songs she took a break and gave the mike over to anyone in the audience who wanted to have a go. As in their old universe, this Wales had a reputation for being a land of song and people took the idea of singing very seriously so it was rare that any native got up to take the mike if they didn't know they could carry a tune. Tourists and foreign sailors, however, were a different matter. One of the people on the rowdy table got up and staggered across to the mike and proceeded to massacre a popular song. Jack winced and Ianto wound up putting his hands over his ears as they were assaulted by the kind of ear-splitting shrieks that one generally associated with someone being murdered.

The rest of the audience wasn't much better and when the man finished the song and then showed signs of beginning another, they showed their reluctance to suffer any further in the time-honoured version. The 'singer's' friends took exception to the booing and made comments regarding the parentage of the crowd. While current society didn't have that big a thing about unmarried parents, they most definitely _did_ have a problem with the strangers intimating that the locals would sleep with anything if there was money involved.

The fight, Jack decided, was pretty average but a lot of fun.

Not that he and Ianto had got involved right away. When the fists started to fly they kept on the outskirts, knowing that Bran and his assistants would soon arrive and break it up. It had been three weeks since they had known any action, however, and when one of the beefier of the strangers had come reeling in their direction and very obviously decided that he couldn't be bothered to walk all the way back to the main fight, they were happy enough to double-team him and put him down. Unfortunately that attracted the attention of some of the others and they had come after them, which had in turn brought some of the locals over to keep things even.

Things had been a bit frenetic but still on the right side of fun right up until the moment someone threw a bottle which managed to crash against the side of Ianto's head and sent him collapsing to the floor in a limp heap. Jack froze for a split second as all his fears and remembered anguish broke free from the corner of his mind where he had pushed them into. He was dimly aware of roaring out his rage and terror as he tore into the crowd, using hand-to-hand combat techniques he'd learned across time and space to clear the area around Ianto's prone figure. He barely noticed that Bran and the others had turned up and that the locals had also stopped fighting the moment they realised it had stopped being fun.

Jack dropped down beside Ianto, frantically feeling for a pulse. _Please,_ he whimpered deep inside himself. _Please don't take him away from me._ He almost fainted with relief when he felt the pulse beating strongly underneath his questing fingers. A second later and a concerned Dorcas appeared beside him. She gave an unsteady laugh of relief when he nodded at her.

"Thank Bast," she said with a sigh as she reached out to touch Ianto gently. "I called the ambulance. They should be here soon."

Even as she spoke the doors to the bar flew open and several police and two paramedics made an appearance. Jack backed off a little to let them do their work and surreptitiously made a check of his own using his wristband. That informed him that Ianto had a concussion but that there was no skull fracture or internal bleeding. Letting out a sigh of relief, Jack allowed the paramedics to load Ianto on to a stretcher so he could be taken to hospital for a more thorough check-up. By this time the instigators of the fight had been arrested and carted off and the rest of the crowd were settling back to have a few more drinks to soothe their shattered nerves.

To Jack's relief, the paramedics were fine about his travelling with them to the hospital, and he held Ianto's hand the entire time. It had frightened him to see Ianto go down like that and he realised that he had become a little complacent in the time since they had come to this new world. The fact that they were no longer involved with Torchwood did not mean that they could not be harmed. Being run over by a bus would be just as lethal as being savaged by a Weevil. And now he couldn't just stand in the path of any danger, knowing that he would get back up again. He watched as Ianto started to regain consciousness, only to screw up his eyes in pain and start to lift his hand towards his head.

"No, don't do that," Jack said, forestalling the paramedic doing the same. He caught Ianto's hand and pulled it down. "You had a nasty bump to the head."

"Mmm, figured that," Ianto mumbled. "Ouch?"

Jack managed a strangled chuckle. "You're so cute when you're concussed," he said in an effort to lighten his mood.

Ianto pulled a face and winced as he felt a stab of pain at his temple and along the side of his face. It was starting the throb badly and he was experienced enough to recognise that he had been hit by something. "Damn, that's embarrassing," he groaned. "I dodge any number of Weevils and get decked in a stupid bar brawl."

"Never mind, I won't tell anyone," Jack said in a conspiratorial whisper.

"Ow! Don't make me laugh," Ianto complained. "Why does my head hurt?" He started to lift his hand and wondered why Jack was holding on to both of them.

Experienced in the way people with concussion sometimes had problems in remembering what had just been told to them, Jack patiently repeated what had happened and then did it again when Ianto asked him the same questions. By that time they had arrived at the hospital and Ianto was taken into the A&E department while Jack was waylaid by a young administrator who needed to complete the paperwork for Ianto's admission. Swallowing his impatience, Jack hurried through the questions, which were mainly identity and residency details. He could see Ianto being taken towards one of the examination bays but there were quite a few people milling about and he soon lost sight of him.

Ianto, meanwhile, had closed his eyes to prevent the bright lights of the A&E department from making his headache even worse. He knew that Jack had been made to stay behind and he was doing his best to stop panic from nibbling away at his self-control. He didn't know why it was so difficult to keep control but his emotions seemed to be all over the place and the fact that one side of his face was throbbing painfully wasn't helping. The sense of dislocation was growing stronger and he wanted Jack nearby. He could hear the two paramedics chatting to one another about getting a coffee afterwards and there was some people shouting about being made to wait in the distance, as well as a small child grizzling while a woman tried to reassure them.

"What the hell... _Teaboy?_"

The voice was clear and sharp and perfectly recognisable. Ianto jerked upright in shock and started to turn his head.

"Owen?"

Something sharp and bright as a supernova went off inside his head and Ianto went out like a light.

OOOO


	5. Strange Reunions

**Strange Reunions**

Owen Harper had had more than his fair share of weird experiences in his life. At the very top of the list was being killed and then becoming a kind of zombie until he was finally destroyed by a wave of radioactive waste. He was pretty sure that not many people – apart from a certain Captain Jack Harkness – could put _that_ on their CV. Coming pretty damn close to the top of the list, however, had been closing his eyes for what he had believed to be that last time only to open them again to find himself several years younger, in a different kind of world to the one he had grown up in and finding that the woman in bed with you was the fiancé you had loved and lost to an alien parasite.

Looking back, Owen could only ruefully bless the fact that Katie was a one-in-a-million kind of woman. She herself remembered being surrounded by panicking medical personnel, feeling an intense pain in her head and then nothing until she had woken up in bed with Owen. She didn't know about the five years Owen had tried to live without her. She didn't know about Torchwood and aliens and immortal Captains and being dead and then being undead and now being alive again. It said a lot for her love and respect for Owen that she didn't run screaming from him during the first hour of their mutual resurrection, especially since she didn't realise she had also come back from the dead. So far as she was concerned she had passed out on an operating table and then woken up.

Fortunately for Owen's sanity and their relationship, there had been things to make her realise that maybe Owen hadn't been getting the good stuff from the hospital pharmacy. She didn't realise that Owen was visibly younger than she remembered. Not by much; Owen estimated that they were both 24 so Katie hadn't really noticed that she was a couple of years younger. It didn't take Owen long to guess that they were inhabiting cloned bodies, though. He couldn't find a single scar on his body and Katie was missing the tattoo she had had done when she was sixteen and her appendix scar. Their bodies might have been copies but Owen was certain that he was himself and after enough thought to make his head hurt he came to the conclusion that even if he was some kind of copy it didn't really matter because he was thinking and reacting just like he knew he would anyway and he _really_ wanted to leave this kind of existential bullshit to Harkness.

They had woken up in what had turned out to be rented accommodation on the main island of the Seychelles, except they were called Chizuri rather than Seychelles and they were a major trading outpost for the British Commonwealth. Owen and Katie had found folders waiting for them which had identity details and documentation which kept their old names but rewrote everything else. Owen had just graduated from medical school and Katie as a biomedical scientist. They were apparently in Chizuri as it was a custom for many new graduates to donate a year or two to the World Council's Emergency Corps and Chizuri was one of the headquarters for the organisation. Each of them had a respectable nest egg and no outstanding debts and had glowing references from their tutors.

They had taken a week off to absorb what was happening and find out as much as they could about this new world they were in. Owen discovered that being involved with Torchwood for nearly five years hadn't made him any more prepared for finding himself on what he soon realised was some kind of alternative Earth. Katie had bizarrely found it easier to cope and Owen had felt just that tiny little bit exasperated.

"How can you just sit there and accept all this?" he demanded one afternoon. "You never even watched _Star Trek_, damn it!"

Katie had smiled up at him and something inside of him had melted as he revelled in the knowledge that she was back in his life once again. "The big picture might have changed, Owen, but the little things are still the same. We have phones, the internet, TV, even if they're all that little bit different. We still have bathrooms and kitchens. We still sleep in beds and drive cars. There's ice cream and daiquiris," she said, hefting the specimen in her hand. "Whoever or whatever has done this has given us a life to live and each other and I'm grateful to them for that."

Staring down at her, Owen had to admit that she was right. He was dead in the other Earth, so why was he fighting this? If it was some weird alien trick to somehow get information from him about Torchwood it was going about it in a really hamfisted way. So far as Owen had been able to determine, there was no Torchwood and everyone seemed to know about aliens. He and Katie had even seen a couple when they had been exploring the capital, Mahe. Owen had tensed up until he realised that no-one seemed to consider the aliens to be all that out of place and the aliens didn't seem to be armed and were more interested in shopping than rampaging.

Kate had grabbed him when she had seen them. "Owen, _look_!" she hissed.

A woman standing next to them had given them both a friendly smile. "First time you've seen a Dhme in the flesh, my dears?" she asked. "You probably come from too cold a place for them to venture. They come here to enjoy our sun and our music. Are they not beautiful?"

Owen had to admit that she was right about that. Both aliens were about six foot in height and bipedal, although the way the legs and arms were jointed seemed a bit off. They looked like intelligent dinosaurs, he decided, with glittering gold and green scales and large eyes of an intense liquid green. They only had some kind of silk tabard on with a wide belt which had pouches and instruments of some kind hanging from it. One of them was haggling enthusiastically over some mangoes while the other one seemed bored to tears. Having been shopping for shoes with Katie, Owen could empathise. They had gone home and looked the aliens up. Owen's thought that Earth had been invaded was soon laid to rest and in the following weeks they saw enough Dhmeii to become used to them and found them to be gentle if often mischievous beings.

Not having any real reason to do otherwise, they had taken up the positions that had been offered to them to be part of the Emergency Corps. The Corps went anywhere there had been a disaster of some kind, whether natural or man-made, and it was made up of the kind of personnel you needed in an emergency: doctors and nurses, engineers, communications and logistics experts, pilots, administrators, sanitation workers, translators and a dozen other fields of expertise. There were full-time veterans who had made this their career and both Owen and Katie soon found themselves completely taken up in learning what was needed. Both of them had the secret advantage of having a lot more experience than the average newly qualified person so it wasn't long before they were deemed fit to go out on their first mission, which was to a small island hit by a hurricane.

They had been asked to give the Corps a year and in the end they gave it two. They made friends and found that the Corps was something of an extended family in many ways. Owen found himself flourishing and shedding a lot of his abrasive manner. He and Katie were married on a beach on one of Chizuri's smaller islands, with their new friends around them. They might have continued working with the Corps except that Katie had had a close call with a guerrilla on one of their missions and Owen was suddenly reminded of how easily he could lose her. He had begged her to agree to leave the Corps and she had been shaken enough by the event that she had agreed. They had had a tremendous farewell party and then they had come back to Britain.

Owen had been drawn to Cardiff. Even though he had rapidly had his suspicions confirmed that there was no Rift and no Torchwood, he still felt a compulsion to come back to the city. Katie had humoured him, even if she had complained about the cold and the wet for the first few months, but Owen had quickly found a job in the Queen Nest Hospital's A&E department and after a few months Katie had landed a research position in the University of Cymru. They found a house and settled down and Owen stopped being afraid of being happy. He even managed to not faint when Katie had cooked him a special dinner and announced he was going to be a father over profiteroles.

He'd let Torchwood fade into the background as he enjoyed his new life. He became the father of a perfectly healthy and completely perfect son they named Leo and he and Katie started to work part-time so that one of them was always at home. If anyone had asked Owen if he wanted to change a single thing in his life he would have laughed in their faces.

And then he saw Ianto Jones being wheeled into the A&E department.

He'd seen Ianto with head injuries before so when he glanced up from treating a teenager with a nasty gash and saw the new patient being wheeled by, he had jerked upright in recognition. "What the hell... _Teaboy?_"

As soon as he had said it, he had second-guessed himself. This person was too young to be Ianto. Then he remembered that he had been a little younger when he had woken up in this world and Ianto had been the youngest of them anyway. His indecision was a moot point anyway, since Ianto had jerked upright and looked around wildly, calling out Owen's name. Before he could spot Owen, however, his eyes had rolled up into the back of his head and he had collapsed back onto the trolley.

Owen had been distracted then by his patient starting to whine with pain and he hastily concentrated on finishing his treatment. The kid was packed on his way with a prescription and a half-hearted admonishment to be more careful when he tried stunt-riding his bike in future. Owen looked around, trying to work out which of the curtained-off bays they had taken Ianto, but then he heard a familiar voice raised in anger.

"I don't care what the waiting times are! He's passed out!"

Owen rolled his eyes. It figured. Where an injured Ianto was, a homicidally anxious Jack Harkness was sure to be close by. He followed the sound of Harkness' bellow, almost tempted to stand to one side and wait until Matron descended on the miscreant who dared to violate the smooth-running of his domain, but he decided that he wanted to see the two of them too much. He got to the cubicle curtain and pulled it back in time to see Jack looming over the hapless junior nurse who was trying to ask him to keep calm.

"So much for smooth and debonair, Harkness. You losing your touch?"

He couldn't hold back the grin as he saw the way Jack froze and then turned to stare at him in complete and utter surprise. It wasn't often that anyone managed to get past that damn poise but right now Jack's jaw was on the ground and his eyes were practically on stalks. Owen was having to work hard at not staring himself. Jack was also looking younger. _Much_ younger. He looked to be about the same age as Ianto and that couldn't have been much more than twenty or maybe even a bit younger. If Owen hadn't heard his voice he might not have recognised him because in many ways the man in front of him was nothing like the Jack Harkness he had known.

Gone was the anachronistic outfit. Jack was wearing a pair of lived-in black jeans with a deep blue t-shirt and a black open waistcoat. His hair was softer and wilder and his face was more open. He was still physically perfect, Owen noted with annoyance, but it was a less heavy look. He didn't have the solid musculature that Owen had discovered to his cost lay beneath the old-fashioned clothes. He was still staring at Owen but the surprise was being overwhelmed by another emotion. Remembering how they had parted, Owen guessed where this was going and managed to brace himself as Jack swooped over to grab him in a crushing bear hug.

"_Owen,"_ Jack managed to choke out.

Owen swallowed, trying to get rid of the solid lump in his throat. He knew how deeply Jack's emotions ran. For all the speed with which he had replaced Suzie with Gwen, that hadn't stopped Jack from grieving for her and he had spiralled down into a near depression after her second death. For Owen, there had been a death and a rebirth with the woman he loved and a career which had grabbed his interest immediately. He guessed that Jack and the others had been left behind to grieve and now he was standing in front of a man who had believed him gone for ever. He knew that he had to do something to distract Jack before he wound up with a crushed rib cage or security was called.

"Christ, Harkness, I can't get rid of you even if I come to a different dimension, can I?" That surprised a somewhat watery laugh from Jack and as Owen had hoped, he let go of him and stepped away. Owen offered him a warm smile, willing to admit to himself that he was glad to see them. "Less of the touchy-feely until I've checked out the Teaboy and seen what he's tried to do to himself this time."

That refocused Jack's attention in nothing flat and he quickly explained to Owen what had happened. Owen nodded thoughtfully and set up the scanner to see if there was any injury that the paramedics had missed. Not for the first time he mourned the loss of the Bekeran scanner since that would have given him a comprehensive and accurate picture of Ianto's physical state. Not that the scanners he had to work with were useless. Based on Dhmeii technology, they were about halfway between what conventional technology back on his Earth could do and what the Bekeran scanner could achieve. It didn't take long for him to get the results while Jack fussed away in the background and Owen sagged with relief when he saw the readings. As if to reinforce that relief, Ianto started to show signs of recovering consciousness.

"Nothing too serious," Owen confirmed to Jack.

"He passed out!" Jack objected and Owen almost laughed at the petulant note in the other man's voice.

"And he's never done that before? Simple diagnosis is that he's suffering from a concussion, he's managed to trap a nerve in his neck, he sat up too fast and he fainted. See? He's coming round now."

Owen leaned over and grinned down at Ianto as the younger man opened his eyes and struggled to focus, wincing a little at the bright light. Owen tossed an order over his shoulder for the nurse to dim the lights directly above their cubicle and turned back in time to see Ianto's eyes widen.

"Owen?"

Ianto was a lot less exuberant in his reaction, which Owen figured was in character. He lifted a hand and poked Owen gingerly in the chest. His eyes widened and before Owen realised what he was up to, Ianto had reached up and placed his fingers against the side of Owen's throat. Owen let him do it, watching as he saw Ianto feel the pulse beating beneath his fingers.

"I'm real," he said softly. "No idea how, but I'm here and I'm breathing again."

Ianto's eyes filled with tears and for one horrible moment Owen thought he was going to go all girly on him. To his relief the moment passed and if Ianto sniffled a little and rubbed at his eyes, Owen was willing to let it slide. He'd cried like a baby when he'd realised Katie was waking up beside him and he'd thought he'd gone to Heaven for a little while.

"Tosh?" Ianto asked after a while.

Owen sighed. That confirmed something he had suspected while he and Tosh had been talking over the comms and Owen had been waiting for his death. He'd wondered if Tosh was injured but she hadn't said anything and he had been afraid to ask. "Not as far as I know," he said. "I did try looking but I couldn't find her. Mind you, I didn't find you two."

"That's because we've only been here for about a month," Jack said as he fussed and fretted around Ianto. "You?"

"Three years," Owen said. He snorted. "So the two of you turn up looking like teenagers and I'm an old man. Typical."

"An old married man," Jack observed, reaching out to pull up the hand where Owen proudly wore his wedding ring. "Someone from this universe?"

Owen shook his head. "Katie," he supplied and watched Jack's eyes widen.

"Whoa, didn't see that one coming," he said thoughtfully.

"She said she would give us a new beginning with some of the old intertwined," Ianto said, the pain showing in the rasp in his voice.

Recalling his responsibilities, Owen ordered the nurse to bring him some pain relief. "You need to get back home and rest. Drink plenty of fluids and you can take some more pain relief later on," he ordered. He waited until Ianto had nodded carefully. "She?" he prompted.

Jack and Ianto exchanged glances and then Jack gave him what Owen suspected was a highly edited version of how they had got here. At the end, and after Owen had given Ianto an injection for the pain, he pursed his lips and nodded. "So it looks like I'm here because of my connection to you and Katie's here because of her connection to me. Looks like I have to say thank you," he grinned.

Both Jack and Ianto were still watching him in wonder and Owen knew how they felt. They might look younger and they might not have Torchwood linking them together but Owen was still ridiculously pleased to see them. "Look, here are my contact details," he said, scribbling them down. "When Teaboy's feeling more himself, why don't we meet up? I'd love you to meet up with Katie and Leo."

Jack immediately looked intrigued. "Who's Leo?"

This time Owen's smile threatened to spit his face in two. "My son."

Life became completely perfect when he saw that he had rendered both Jack and Ianto completely speechless.

OOOO


	6. Interregnum

**Interregnum**

_Patterns of power meshed and flowed across space and time. They passed through all things, including a specific time and place just outside Cardiff. Ancient mechanisms counted down as previously commanded. The race that had created this place had been masters of space and time, manipulating it the way an artist used oils or wood or stone. They had created a masterpiece and made a promise and they were beings of their word._

_Time was passing, like grains of sand passing through an hourglass. It had no power over the beings that had once been here but they understood how it bound the younger races. External sensors marked the cycles of human civilisation. They marked the appearance of man-made hydrocarbons in the atmosphere, the sharp taint of fissionables, the resonance of fusion. They felt the caress of radio emissions generated by satellites as they passed overhead. The mechanisms noted all of this and began the final countdown. Soon it would be time to begin. Soon it would be time to awaken their charge._

_Deep beneath rock and earth, Ceridwen dreamed and stirred. _


	7. The Clever Child

**The Clever Child**

"We need to look for Tosh."

The only surprising thing about that statement, Jack decided, was that it had taken until the next day for Ianto to come out with it. By the time Jack had got him back to the flat, Ianto had been willing enough to strip down to his boxers and lay down on the bed. Jack had enjoyed fussing around him and making sure he drank some fruit juice and rested but Jack hadn't really been happy with leaving him alone and had eventually lain down on the bed with him, picking up the detective novel he was currently reading and amusing Ianto by making wild deductions about what was happening. By the end of the evening Jack was fairly happy about the two of them settling down to sleep, although he did set his wristband to wake him up after a couple of hours so he could check on Ianto.

The night passed uneventfully and Ianto was definitely brighter the next day, although his neck was still sore and his head ached a little. Jack vetoed any lovemaking until Ianto was fully back to health, which annoyed the other man immensely but Jack successfully distracted him with a full fry-up breakfast. It wasn't until Ianto had finished stuffing himself with his favourite breakfast and the dishes had been put in the dishwasher until they had a full load that Ianto raised the subject of Tosh.

"Owen said he couldn't find her," Jack pointed out, more to play Devil's advocate than for any other reason.

"Owen is a fine doctor and was an excellent field agent but apart from when he was playing games I wouldn't call him more than average on a computer," Ianto shot back. "I sure as hell wouldn't depend on him to do a definitive search for something."

"How do we do this, then?" Jack asked. They didn't have the resources they would have had back in Torchwood and he was curious to see how Ianto would tackle this.

Ianto grinned, looking more like his old self despite the large bruise on the side of his face. "Let's see what we can do with what we've got first. If it's not enough, you can whip me up a 51st century computer."

Jack snorted. "I wish," he said dryly, knowing that half the components needed for such a beast would be unobtainable. For a moment he mourned Mainframe and hoped that it had somehow survived the destruction and would be found by someone who would appreciate it.

Ianto went into their study and settled down in front of his computer. Both it and Jack's were already markedly different from the fairly basic models they had been gifted with. Ianto might use a conventional laptop for general surfing but he was used to having a lot more computing power at his fingertips when he was doing serious research and Jack was simply unable to pass a machine without trying to tinker with it. Between the two of them, they had raided the computer suppliers in the city and cobbled together something which had a lot more scope and power. He booted it up and tossed Jack a mischievous look before he launched into his search.

It had taken them less than a couple of hours when they had first started to go online to find out that there wasn't just one internet: there was two. After a little confusion they had realised that the Web was the territory of the amateur, where all kinds of wild and wacky stuff could be found, while the Net was the province of business and science. The Net was policed, monitored and vetted while the Web was a far more laid back affair, with only child and mental health protection issues being addressed and ferociously enforced. The two systems ran independently of one another, but unlike the IPv4 and IPv6 systems back on their old Earth, these were compatible and some areas of the Web and Net overlapped.

Since his university course would probably focus on the WebNet to a degree, Ianto had done a lot more exploring than Jack and that showed now as he swung into action. After a moment Jack grabbed one of the chairs and reversed it before sitting down to watch in admiration. He and the others had always known that researching was Ianto's forte but they had rarely got the opportunity to watch him as he had generally needed to do it when they were also busy doing something. Jack watched the clever fingers stroke the keyboard and shivered as he thought of them stroking something else.

"Mind out of the gutter, Jack," Ianto said with amusement.

Jack jerked. "How did you-"

Ianto glanced away from the screen to give him a fond a smile. "I know you. And your breathing was speeding up."

In the end Ianto was mildly annoyed to find that he didn't need any vast degree of internet mojo to find Tosh. He found her as soon as he accessed the electoral roll for Cardiff. After that it was simplicity itself to backtrack and expand the search until he knew as much as was possible without actually going to her home and meeting her. Jack laughed at the miffed expression on his lover's face.

"Well I was hoping for a bit of a challenge," Ianto defended himself before relaxing and grinning as well.

"I'm all for easy wins every now and then," Jack said wryly.

He reached out a finger to stroke the image of Tosh that was currently on the screen. Her hair was shorter than it had been, a sleek bob cut to chin length and emphasising her clean bone structure. She was working as a postgraduate student on a research project with the University of Cymru that was researching the formation and evolution of stars and the team had a shared blog where they were all introduced with a small biography. Tosh was one of two computer wizards and an expert at setting up theoretical models for the various scenarios the team was researching.

"Who came over with her?" Jack asked. "Tommy?"

Ianto shook his head. "Her mother."

"Ah." Jack nodded his head sadly, remembering how it had almost destroyed Tosh to learn that her mother had died during the struggle with the terrorists. It had taken all of Jack's skill to make her see that she had no reason to blame herself and every reason to blame the terrorists for what had happened. "Yes, that would have made her happy."

"Mrs Sato is listed as a widow who lives in Penarth. Tosh moved out after she got her degree and got a flat that she shared with another girl named Kashore Sele."

"That's new," Jack noted with interest. "She told me she was always reluctant to share living space with other people."

"I think being dead can make you look at things a little differently," Ianto said quietly. "Anyway, Kashore moved out about a month ago to go travelling and…" Ianto paused for a moment and Jack watched as his eyebrows rose towards his hairline.

"What?" he demanded.

Ianto gave him a bemused look. "A man called Andy Davidson moved in."

"Andy? _Gwen's_ Andy?" Jack demanded incredulously.

Ianto was already typing frantically and after a moment he shook his head. "I think this is this universe's version of Andy Davidson. He has an entire herd of relatives and a career that involves far too many people having worked with him over several years. I'm not sure if this is a coincidence but I don't think he's like us."

Jack leaned forward to look at the photo Ianto had found. This was definitely the Andy that he remembered but there was something slightly different as well. He was less self-effacing and more confident, gazing out at the camera with calm but humorous eyes. He was wearing some kind of uniform and a quick check turned up the information that Andy was an astronaut with several years of experience under his belt.

"I'll be damned," Jack breathed. "And Gwen didn't think he could hack it in Torchwood."

"To be fair, this is an alternate universe Andy," Ianto pointed out, but he was looking thoughtful as well.

"Tosh might have been attracted by the similarity at first," Jack mused, "but the fact that he's moved in with her indicates that she decided to deepen the relationship."

"He might just be sharing the flat," Ianto said after a moment. "From what I could dig up he's away fairly often doing ferry runs to the space stations and the Moon colonies." He did his best not to sound envious and failed miserably. Jack grinned.

"Don't turn too green. Andy's the equivalent of an airline pilot. This Earth has had space travel long enough for the nearer space flights to be routine."

"Sort of wanted to be an airline pilot when I was growing up," Ianto told him with a smile.

"Really?" Jack brightened up. "We'll have to get you a pilot's uniform and do a little role-playing," he said enthusiastically.

Ianto laughed and shook his head even though a definite shiver of anticipation ran through him at the thought.

"So she's safe and happy and in Cardiff," Jack said with a smile. "Shall we go and visit?"

"I think we should maybe send a message first rather than just turn up on her doorstep," Ianto suggested.

"Awww, I don't get to make the dramatic entrance?" Jack pouted.

Ianto hesitated, tempted despite himself. It _would_ be nice to suddenly appear from out of nowhere. Even as the thought crossed his mind, his computer pinged and an IM window opened up.

TOSHI: _Ianto?_

Ianto froze before exchanging a startled look with Jack.

TOSHI: _Ianto, this search has your fingerprints all over it. Please tell me that it's you._

Ianto sucked in a breath and heard Jack's soft "Yatta!" He swiftly typed in a confirmation and sent it. Almost immediately an answer pinged back.

TOSHI: _WHERE ARE YOU? IS JACK THERE AS WELL?_

Laughing at the capitalisation, Ianto swiftly typed in an affirmative. There was a pause of several seconds and they exchanged worried looks. The next thing they knew, the computer screen blanked and then cleared to reveal an excited looking Tosh peering out at them. Her eyes widened and she clapped her hands together, her grin almost splitting her face in two even as her eyes glittered with tears.

"Oh, it is you, it is! Oh, now everything is perfect!"

Jack scooted the chair forward and blew a kiss at the screen. "You've ruined my dramatic entrance," he complained with an overdone pout.

Tosh giggled. "You look so young! I woke up looking eighteen as well, but I've been here for a while. Do you know what happened?" Ianto and Jack both nodded but when Jack opened his mouth to explain she held up her hand imperiously. "No, I want to meet you! Shall I come to you or will you come to me?"

"Why don't you come here?" Jack suggested. "It'll be nice to have someone visit."

"Tosh, do you know that Owen is here?" Ianto asked. He was confused because he didn't think Tosh would have had problems in tracking Owen down.

Tosh nodded and looked embarrassed. "Yes, but he has Katie with him and I wasn't sure if he'd appreciate my appearing back in his life. I wasn't sure I could trust myself, to be honest, but that was before I met Andy."

"Oho, so he isn't just your flatmate!" Jack crowed when he saw the way she blushed. "Oh, I am so going to want details, young lady!"

"Behave," Ianto said in exasperation. "Would you like to come round, Tosh?"

"Absolutely," Tosh said firmly. "Give me half an hour and then I shall want to know everything. Especially how you got that bruise, Ianto Jones!"

She gave him a mock ferocious scowl and the screen went blank again. The two men sat in silence for a moment.

"Our clever Toshiko," Jack said with affection.

"I'm glad," Ianto said simply. Then his eyes widened in horror. "Omigosh, she's coming over and we don't have anything to give her to eat!"

He dashed from the room leaving Jack in a state of confusion since he knew that their kitchen was fully stocked with all manner of good things to eat. After a while he chalked it up to the Welsh notion of hospitality and wandered off after him. He might not have Torchwood, or Gwen or Gray but he had most of his adopted family around him now and this world was looking better by the day.

"Thank you," he whispered into the silence, hoping that somehow the alien would know how much he appreciated what she had given him.

OOO


	8. Old friends and New Thoughts

**A/N: Apologies if I have got the Japanese wrong in this chapter. And yes, there is a bit of foreshadowing going on… **

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><p><strong>Old Friends and New Thoughts<strong>

Jack had intended to open the door to Toshiko and make some extremely witty remark. Something along the lines of 'did you miss us?' or 'long time no see'. Ianto had vanished into the kitchen while muttering about various recipes under his breath and hadn't surfaced by the time the doorbell went. Since it was almost exactly half an hour since they had spoken to Toshiko, Jack was pretty certain it had to be her so he sauntered over and threw the door open with a large grin on his face.

"Hey, Tosh, did you- _oof_!"

One hundred and twenty five pounds of Japanese female slammed into him and wrapped herself around him in a bear hug that threatened to squeeze all the oxygen out of him. Jack staggered back a few paces and looked down in amusement to where Tosh had buried her face in his chest and was making growly noises. He rubbed a hand against one shoulder while hugging her with his other arm.

"Gomennasai, imouto," he whispered gently.

She left off growling and looked up at him, her eyes glittering with unshed tears. "Shimpai shinai-de, o-nichan," she said with a shaky smile. Then she mock scowled. "But you had better not do it again."

The exchange seemed to centre her and she pushed away from Jack, looking him up and down. Jack smiled to himself as he closed the door and ushered her into the main room, knowing what she was going through. He was still getting used to the face that looked back at him from every mirror. After over a hundred of years of looking more or less exactly the same, it was still a shock to see a markedly younger version of himself making faces at him. He'd caught Ianto watching him at times with an expression of intense wonder on his face but he hadn't said anything. It was still too new, too wonderful, and while Ianto hadn't changed as dramatically Jack still loved to see the way his lover was remembering what it was to be young again.

"You're looking good," he commented as he studied her.

Toshiko laughed and did a mock twirl. She was wearing black linen trousers and an emerald green booty blouse in muslin. Some discreet gold jewellery, high-heeled ankle boots and a large leather-look shoulder bag completed the look. She gave Jack a mischievous look. "I might say the same for you! Where's Ianto?"

"Here," Ianto said, coming out of the kitchen with a tray loaded down with coffee and biscuits. He hastily put it down and braced himself as she homed in on him, enveloping him in the same bone-crushing hug she had given Jack. "Oh, I missed you, cariad," he said fervently.

"I missed you too, Ianto, so much," Tosh said fervently. "I never realised how close we were until I woke up and you weren't here for me to talk to."

Ianto dropped a quick kiss on the top of her head. "I'm here now. Both of us are."

"And we want to know _all_ about what's happened to you," Jack said with a grin.

They went to sit on the large curved sofa in front of the TV screen and Ianto put the tray on the coffee table in front and served everyone. Tosh gave a shaky smile as she saw vanilla creams on the plate.

"I was so happy when I discovered they had vanilla creams on this side of the dimensional barrier but how come you have some? I only gave you half an hour's warning."

Ianto reddened. "I saw them in the shop and thought of you so bought them as a sort of memorial. Stupid, I know," he mumbled into his coffee.

Tosh reached out and grasped one of his hands. "No, not stupid," she said quietly. "Just thoughtful. Which is just like you. Even as a teenager," she added teasingly.

"I'm just a teenager physically," Ianto objected in relieved amusement.

"Amen to that!" Jack said. "Let's hear it for youthful stamina," he continued with a cheerful leer.

"Shut up, jack," Tosh and Ianto said in perfect unison. There was a moment of startled silence before they all dissolved into laughter while surreptitiously wiping away the tears that threatened.

"So you woke up..?" Jack prompted.

Tosh nodded but paused to take a sip of Ianto's coffee and then sigh with pleasure. "You do something to the coffee, Ianto Jones," she observed. "I've had some very good coffee on this world but it somehow always just missed the mark. This-" she hefted up the mug, "-is like coming home."

Ianto inclined his head in acknowledgement of the comment but couldn't help blushing. He wasn't sure what he did do that made such a difference but he was always pleased with the result. "Good to know that I haven't lost my touch," he said. "Not one word, Jack," he went on to warn without missing a beat.

Jack closed his mouth and pulled a face before grinning. Tosh shook her head fondly. This was just like old times and she couldn't help wanting to laugh out loud all the time. She wondered if she had made a mistake in not contacting Owen the way she had wanted to, so very desperately, but she knew that that very desperation had been the clue that she should keep away.

"I woke up here five years ago." She saw their startled reactions and gave them a rueful smile. "I know. Owen's only been here three years and I'm guessing the two of you are recent arrivals. I think…" She paused and bit her lip. "I think whoever or whatever brought me here knew that I needed time to figure out who I am and what I wanted from life. What with the terrorists and UNIT and my mother dying and my having the worst luck when it came to relationships and then my, well, dying…" She paused and took a deep breath.

"I'm sorry, Tosh," Jack said quietly, taking her hand. "I wasn't the best of bosses-"

"Stop that right now, Jack Harkness!" Tosh said fiercely. "If it hadn't been for you giving me a sense of purpose and the two of you being my friends I would probably have been a basket case ages ago. I… I never really got on that brilliantly with Gwen," she continued, reddening slightly. "We were too different and I think I bored her. And Owen, well, you know what I was like with Owen."

She paused and used the excuse of needing to refill her mug as an excuse to collect her thoughts. "When I woke up and found myself in a house in Penarth with my mother and I realised I was aged 18 and had a place in Cardiff University I really thought I had lost my mind. Then I wondered if this was some kind of bizarre afterlife. Okasan was much calmer about it than I was. She reasoned that we should just live our lives until we found out what was happening and in the meantime we had one another."

"We've been given places in the university as well," Ianto said.

Tosh nodded. "I did think about not attending because I doubted there was anything I could learn there but in the end I decided to give it a try and I was glad I did." She blushed again. "I never fitted in the first time I went to university. I was too introverted and looked down at the other students for not studying hard enough. This time I knew that life has to be lived and I had a much better time. Plus this world did have things to teach me. And it gave me access to resources so I could build some scanners to try and find out what was going on."

Jack shook his head and saw the same rueful admiration on Ianto's face. People tended to underestimate Tosh because she was so quiet and unassuming but she was every bit as tough and stubborn as Ianto or even Jack. "There's no Rift," he said.

"No, there isn't," Tosh agreed. "That was a bit of a shock. There's no Torchwood or UNIT, either. But there _is_ something," she finished triumphantly.

Jack and Ianto both blinked. "What?"

Tosh dug into her bag and brought out what looked like a sleek PADD and a sheaf of papers. "I've been here for five years, remember, and I've run regular scans." She unfolded the papers to show graphs and readouts. "There's an energy signature-"

"That's nothing to do with us now, Tosh," Jack interjected.

Tosh blinked, giving Jack a surprised look. "Maybe not officially, but there isn't really anyone else to look into it, since the powers-that-be haven't been looking for this kind of thing. We could-"

"_**No!"**_

Tosh stopped abruptly and Ianto stiffened in his seat. That single, brittle, explosive denial told him that Jack was nowhere near as calm and settled as he had tried to make himself out to be.

"No," Jack repeated, less forcefully but with equal intensity. "Leave it, Tosh, please."

"But-" Tosh began in bewilderment before she caught Ianto's frantic motions for her to drop it.

"I lost Owen and then I lost him again and you as well," Jack said, his voice becoming ragged. "I lost Gray and I came so damn close to losing Ianto." He gave Tosh a haunted look, his eyes a little wild. "I can't go through that again, Tosh. I just can't."

Tosh's eyes widened with understanding. "Oh, Jack, I'm so sorry. I never really had to grieve for Owen because you brought him back and when I died I woke up here almost immediately. I forgot that you both had time to grieve Owen and myself." She frowned and turned to look at Ianto. "But what's that about nearly losing Ianto?"

Seeing the way Jack's hands were trembling slightly, Ianto took a deep breath and started to tell her what had happened since her death. She went white when she heard that Ianto had been dying in the chamber at Thames House when the alien woman had appeared and given them their second chance. Her jaw nearly hit the floor when Ianto dropped the bombshell that Jack was no longer immortal.

"Jack, I don't mean to sound disbelieving, but are you sure?"

Jack visibly shook himself and gave her a small smile. "Pretty sure. Any marks I get stay and I heal at a normal human rate. I cut myself as well and it took about the right amount of time to heal."

Ianto cleared his throat. He was used to Jack's continued joy over the amount of time it took a lovebite to fade but he had been a little bit unsettled over Jack's fascination over the time it took the small glass cut to heal. He had nightmares about Jack wanting him to cut him or harm him in some other way and fervently hoped that this was just a passing thing. "Naturally we don't want to take it too far," he said and hoped like hell that he had kept the fear out of his voice. He realised that he hadn't when Jack shot him a penetrating look before coming over to sit beside him.

"I'm not going to do anything drastic, Ianto," he promised, reaching out to grab Ianto's hand. "I know I used to say how I wanted to die for good but now I know I have the one life and a second chance I want to _live_ that life." He pulled back to include both of them in his gaze. "I want to do all the things I've missed out on. I never really had a childhood much past ten and I joined the military instead of going to university. I was too dislocated while I was a Time Agent to do things you'd consider normal and then I was a conman and constantly on the move which didn't really change when I was with the Doctor. I sort of thought about being normal when I was stranded in Victorian Wales but it didn't take me long to realise I was immortal and then Torchwood found me."

He paused and sighed. "I'd watch other people sometimes and wonder what it was like to just be ordinary. To do ordinary things and have an ordinary life. I always used to dismiss it, thinking I'd be bored to tears in a week or so but now I've got the chance. I can be a student. Do all the stuff that older people disapprove of students doing. Ianto and I can go backpacking around Europe or Lemuria if we want to. I can have hobbies that don't involve weird alien tech or life-and-death situations. I can be just another face in a crowd."

The other two gazed at him, hearing the wistful note in his voice. Ianto felt like crying. Jack had sometimes mentioned something like that, saying that he could hire new staff and then he and Ianto could go off into the sunset, but Ianto had always assumed that he was joking and laughed. Now he wondered how much of it had been joking and how much a carefully disguised plea. If Ianto had said yes, would Jack have followed through? Ianto would never know, probably, but his heart ached for his battered immortal lover, who had never dared to beg people to let him step down from the pedestal they had put him on. He leaned forward and gave Jack a gentle kiss.

"You could never be just another face in the crowd, Jack," he murmured. "You'll always be someone special, no matter how hard you try to be otherwise." To his utter surprise, Jack blushed fiercely.

"We can do normal," Tosh said equally quietly. She gave Jack a reassuring smile. "I didn't think I could do normal either, not after what I'd seen and done, but I got used to not looking for aliens out of the corner of my eye. And I made friends and we did silly things like go to the beach."

Ianto laughed as he saw Jack's mood shift from vulnerable to hopeful in seconds. Sometimes he could read his lover like a book. "Let me guess: you'd like to go to the beach?"

"It could be fun," Jack said before a gleam of mischief entered his eyes. "And you could wear Speedos!"

"No, I could not!" Ianto said, revolted.

"Aw, c'mon, just for me?" Jack wheedled.

"Absolutely not," Ianto said firmly.

Later on, while Jack was happily surfing to buy them swimming gear – which Ianto had demanded he had a right of veto on – Tosh helped Ianto to put together a meal. Ianto made sure that Jack was safely out of earshot before turning to her.

"What kind of readings, Tosh?" he asked quietly.

Tosh shot him a wary look before also looking to check that Jack couldn't hear them. "Jack wasn't interested," she pointed out.

"I know, and I respect his wishes, but I also know him a little better than he knows himself. Right now he's high as a kite on being an 'ordinary mortal', but if something happens to risk other peoples' lives he's not the type to stand to one side. I'd rather have some warning."

She nodded thoughtfully as she buttered the slices of bread to go with the fish and salad that Ianto had prepared. "It's not the Rift. That much I'm certain of because I monitored it enough to know it in all its moods. This is more like a pulse. It comes and goes and there are sometimes months between incidents. I haven't been able to work out the cycle as yet but it's definitely there."

"Does it correlate with anything? Does this Cardiff have Weevils?" Ianto asked. It felt odd to be having a Torchwoodish conversation again.

"If there are Weevils they're a lot more effective in hiding than our population was because I haven't heard or seen anything," Tosh informed him as they started to carry things to the dining table. She lowered her voice still further so there was no chance of Jack hearing. "And yes, the energy seems to be linked to weather patterns. When it's climbing towards a spike there are thunderstorms. Thunderstorms local to the Cardiff area that appear no matter what the weather forecast says."

"No effect on people, though?"

Tosh shook her head. "Just the weather. And before you ask, I don't think it's anything to do with the fairies. There have been no reports of children vanishing at those times."

Ianto relaxed. The last thing he wanted was for them to have to tangle with something like their world's fairies without even the most minimal of equipment. Not that they could have done anything even if they were armed to the teeth, he corrected himself mentally.

"Thank Heaven for small mercies."

Tosh gave a tight nod of agreement but then they were distracted by Jack calling to them from the laptop. Ianto promptly rejected the first two choices that Jack had made for him, on the grounds that he did not want to make a complete fool of himself on the beach. He grudgingly agreed to the dark red aquashorts that were Jack's third choice, then paused and rolled his eyes when he saw the grin on Jack's face.

"Those were the ones you wanted me to have all along," he guessed. Jack's grin widened impossibly and Ianto suppressed the urge to cuff him around the ear. "Come on; let's eat while the salmon's still warm."

The meal was light-hearted and it didn't take long for Jack to home in on the fact that Tosh had a boyfriend. "Is he this universe's counterpart to our Andy Davidson?" he asked curiously.

"I don't really know for sure," Tosh confessed. "I never really paid any attention to him back then. One of his cousins was in my class and she was always talking about him. I thought the name sounded vaguely familiar but I had such a shock when he came to pick her up one afternoon and I saw who he was! There's definitely a physical resemblance but other that that, I don't really know."

"His background said he was an astronaut?" Ianto prodded.

Jack grinned. "Ianto wants to be an astronaut when he grows up," he mock-whispered to Tosh, then ducked as Ianto threw a coaster at him.

"Andy was always determined to be an astronaut," Tosh said with a smile. "He learned to fly as soon as it was legal and studied engineering before going to work as a shuttle engineer with HighRoad Enterprises. That's a private company that maintains a base on the Moon," she added when she saw their blank expressions. "They do a lot of research into artificial ecosystems and they have the contract for the ecosystems for the three far-range ships that are being built at the moment."

"The ones that will be heading for the outer planets?" Jack asked.

Tosh nodded. "It's Andy's dream to be on one of those ships but he's still fairly junior so the chances are slim. He applied to join the United Kingdoms Space Corps and has been flying for them for the past two years. He's flown to all the space stations and the Moon and is shortlisted for the next Mars mission." She flashed them a brilliant smile. "He arranged for me to go up to the Georgiana. That's one of the tourist space stations," she elaborated. "He gets concessions, like an airline pilot."

"You've been up in space?" Ianto hoped he didn't look and sound as jealous as he was.

"Yes, and it was wonderful!"

"Zero-g sex?" Jack asked with a waggle of his eyebrows. Tosh promptly went beetroot red and Jack practically fell off the chair laughing. "Let me guess: it was a total disaster?"

"It… took a while to figure it out," Tosh admitted.

"Never understood why people were so obsessed with it," Jack admitted. "It's murderously complicated to do unless you use a sleeping bag or something. One wrong move and you're drifting around looking a complete idiot."

"Sounds like you're speaking from experience," Tosh said slyly and Jack smiled.

"Well, I did want to see what all the fuss was about but I can hand on heart say that I prefer my sex in a gravity well of some kind. Does he treat you right?" he demanded.

Tosh blinked and then gave Jack a gentle smile. "Yes, Jack, he treats me very well. We were friends before we were lovers and we're trying to take it slow because if he gets the call to go to Jupiter he'll be away for at least two years. I have to say, though… I'd wait for him if that happened. He really is kind and generous and fun to be with."

"I'm glad," Jack said simply and Ianto echoed the sentiment. After all the bad luck she had had in the past it was good to see Tosh enjoying a steady relationship.

The conversation turned a little bit more general as they finished the meal and Ianto cleared the dishes away before bringing out more coffee. Tosh told them about the research project she was involved with. Jack was able to keep up with the hard science part while Ianto could ask intelligent questions about the computing aspect. They told her about the background they had been given and the courses they would be embarking on and Tosh nodded thoughtfully.

"Sounds good. You'll have lots of options to choose from and you won't have to settle for something because you need the money. She did something similar for my mother and me. The house was fully paid for, my mother had a substantial inheritance when my father supposedly died and I had won a small lottery which was more than enough to pay for my degree and for me to afford to rent a place of my own. I stayed with okasan at first because I wanted to be close to her and catch up on what we had missed but then I felt ready to spread my wings. Besides, okasan was being courted and I didn't want to cramp her style," she said with a twinkle.

"Tosh, is it okay if we tell Owen that you're here?" Ianto asked. "He said something about wanting to get together with us and-"

"Yes, I'd like that," Tosh agreed. "I was worried about doing it at first but now I'm settled and I have Andy while Owen has Katy so yes, I think this is a good time. I have missed him. I missed you all. My new friends are wonderful but old friends are even better."

"Amen to that," Jack said sincerely. His eyes gleamed. "Why don't we arrange for us all to have a day at the beach?" he said. "You could bring Andy and Owen could bring Katy and Leo and we could make a day of it. Maybe have a picnic or a barbecue. Or even a picnic _and_ a barbecue!"

"Oh, Lord," Ianto said ruefully as he watched Jack gear himself up. "You had better say yes," he told Tosh, "because otherwise he'll only nag."

"Nag? I don't _nag_," Jack said in outrage. "I just point out how wrong everyone else is and how right I am! Hey, we could play Frisbee! I have _always_ wanted to play Frisbee!"

Ianto sighed and rolled his eyes theatrically, enjoying the sound of Tosh's giggles and Jack's melodramatic plans. "I only hope the beach is ready for us," he murmured as he started to make lists of what they would need to bring.

OOO


	9. Whispers and Promises

A/N: Apologies for the long delay in posting. Real Life decided to ambush me! Anyway, a truly soppy, fluffy chapter this time around, with a little bit of raunchiness thrown in, so avoid if you have an aversion to such things! ;-)

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><p><strong>Whispers and Promises<strong>

Tosh eventually left in the early evening, after they had contacted Owen to give him the news and make the suggestion of meeting up on the beach. Owen had been a little prickly about Tosh not having contacted him but when Tosh had admitted that she hadn't wanted to complicate his time with Katie, he had been elbowed off the phone by Katie. She had immediately started chatting to Tosh and once the ice had been broken the two women had exchanged telephone numbers and had made tentative plans to talk again the next day.

"Should I be worried?" Owen demanded when he got the phone back.

Jack looked to where Tosh was sitting with a relieved expression on her face and a hint of mischief in her eyes and he laughed. "Oh, yeah," he said and then had to hand the phone over to Ianto because he was laughing too much over Owen's moans.

They decided to meet up for a beach expedition the Saturday after next, which gave Owen time to arrange his rota. Tosh stayed to have dinner with them and they exchanged stories about settling into their new lives. She left after they had cleared up and Jack went to stand outside on the balcony, watching her make for the bus stop in the gathering twilight. When he went back inside there was no sign of Ianto and Jack settled down in front of the TV and switched it on, heading for the news channels to do some more background research.

It wasn't until he had been watching for about an hour that he realised that there was still no sign of Ianto. Feeling mildly put out that the Welshman hadn't come to lean against the sofa and make sarcastic comments about the more gossipy segments of the news, Jack shut off the TV and went in search of his lover. There was no sign of him in the kitchen or the study so Jack made for the bedroom, wondering if Ianto had decided to make an early night of it without telling him.

He walked into their bedroom to find it ablaze with candlelight. The air was heavy with the scent of candle wax and jasmine, which it hadn't taken Ianto long to discover was one of Jack's favourite scents. There was no sign of Ianto but the door to the bathroom was open and the same warm flickering light could be seen through there, along with the sound of water running. Grinning with anticipation, Jack started to pull his t-shirt over his head as he made for the bathroom.

As he had suspected, Ianto was busy pouring some of the oil they both favoured into the bath. He glanced up as Jack walked in, his expression of concentration morphing into a smile of welcome that broadened as Jack kicked off his jeans and underpants as he finished shoving them down over his hips. Ianto, Jack noted with delight, was already naked under his bathrobe and he acceded happily to Jack's demand for a kiss.

"Get in the bath," he said when they eventually broke off the slow, languorous kiss.

"Hmm, being assertive and proactive," jack said with a smile. "Love it." He slid into the warm water with a sigh of pleasure, then cocked an inquiring eye at Ianto. "You're not joining me?"

Ianto gave him a crooked smile. "Not this time. I just feel like pampering you."

He turned to reach for a nearby sponge and missed the thoughtful look that Jack gave him. This was something they had done before but it had usually happened when Jack had had a rough death or a case had gone spectacularly wrong and Jack had felt it was his fault. Why Ianto felt it necessary to do this now when Jack had found out that he had three quarters of his family back in his life was a bit of a mystery, but Jack decided that the best thing to do would be to go with the flow and wait until he found out a bit more.

The important thing was that while he had always appreciated the care and attention Ianto had lavished on him during these times, Ianto got just as much out of it by being allowed to help Jack. Ianto always found it far easier to give help rather than be helped and Jack had known that he had become special to Ianto when Ianto had started to tell him when he needed something for himself.

Ianto took his time bathing him, his touch moving from intimate to neutral and back again. Jack had always been responsive to Ianto's touch and his having been regressed to eighteen and made mortal again had done nothing to affect his libido where the other man was concerned, so he was more than willing to obey Ianto's suggestion that he move back into the bedroom once he had dried off. He hadn't noticed the old sheet that had been tossed on the bed the first time he had come through but he did when he went back and his skin tingled in anticipation. He'd taught Ianto all about erotic massages and Ianto had been a very able pupil.

"Don't get me wrong, but why are you doing this?" he asked as he lay face-down on the bed and tilted his head to watch Ianto reach for the oil that had been warming over a small burner.

Ianto just smiled and shook his head before dribbling the first trail of warm oil along Jack's spine. He went to work and Jack was soon a contented mass of pleasure sprawled on the bed, torn between arousal and somnolence. He turned over to lie on his back and smiled up at Ianto as he came to lean over Jack and kiss him with slow thoroughness. Jack reached up to cup his hand against the nape of Ianto's neck when the other man started to draw away again, keeping him close and reaching up to claim another kiss. He could feel Ianto smiling against his lips before he relaxed into the kiss but when Jack used his other hand to reach under Ianto's dressing gown to caress his hip, Ianto pulled back and shook his head.

"Not yet," he murmured.

"Ianto…" Jack knew he was whining but he didn't care.

"Ssh," Ianto said, placing a finger against Jack's lips. "I need to do this."

"But I'm fine," Jack said. "I don't need this. I just need you."

Ianto gave him a charmed smile and swooped in for another kiss. "Love you too, my Captain, but you do need this. You showed me that this afternoon."

Jack's bewilderment was cut short when Ianto really started to go to town on him. Three years into a sexual relationship and two years into an emotional one, Ianto knew every touch and every move guaranteed to bring Jack to full aching arousal. He made use of that knowledge now and Jack was soon barely able to remember his name, let alone hold on to any idea of arguing with Ianto. Ianto used his mouth to wicked effect and Jack was soon shuddering under the throes of climax before collapsing back onto the bed, his heart thundering in his ears and his chest heaving as he struggled to recover his breath. He was hyper-aware of Ianto sliding up alongside him, the silk of his dressing gown ghosting across his sensitive skin.

"You have nothing to prove to us, Jack," Ianto whispered in his ear. "No reason to hate yourself for the decisions you made, no need to regret anything that happened." He reached over to hold Jack in place as he felt the other man tense beside him. "None of us have ever blamed you for doing what needed to be done. All of us were proud – _are_ proud – to have known you and followed you. We would all do it again and we would all accept the consequences."

Jack pulled in a shuddering breath. Of course Ianto had caught that moment of weakness on his part when he was talking to Tosh. He turned into the other man's comforting embrace. "So much death, Ianto," he said in a ragged whisper. "I can't do it again. I don't have the strength."

Ianto's embrace tightened fractionally. "You are the strongest man I have ever known, Jack," he said softly. "You've gone through tests that would have shattered any other man and you've held your head high, but every man needs to be able to let go of his burden some time and rest. No-one will think any less of you. Tosh slipped back into the Torchwood mindset, that's all. She died without knowing the price you paid for gray's return and for what came afterwards."

"The Doctor-"

"The Doctor isn't human, Jack," Ianto shot back. "He isn't human and quite frankly he isn't very fair. He expects too much and is too quick to criticise. He condemns Torchwood and honours UNIT but it wasn't UNIT who stood against the government when they wanted to hand children over to the aliens. I know you love him but I don't. I respect him but I can't love him. He's hurt you too deeply and casually for me to ever love him."

There was a moment of silence before Jack sighed and relaxed into his embrace. "He was different before he changed," he said quietly. "I think he would have come back for me if he hadn't changed."

"Maybe so, but he still knew what had happened to you and I find it hard to believe that a Timelord wouldn't have been able to get a message to you somehow, even if he couldn't meet you in the flesh." Ianto struggled to control his longstanding antipathy towards the Doctor and focused on the here and now. "Let the past go, Jack," he ordered his lover quietly. "We lived through it and now we have a new life, a second chance. No more shadows hanging over us. No more recriminations, reminders or crazed ex-boyfriends to make our lives a lot more interesting than we would like!" He smiled as he felt the huff of laughter pass through Jack's body. "How did the song go? It's a new day, it's a new dawn and a nice life?"

Jack chuckled. "It's a new dawn, it's a new day and a new life for me, and I'm feelin' good," he sang.

"Are you?"

Just for a second, Ianto's insecurities were visible before they vanished again, but Jack caught them. His smile became tender and he leaned forward to rub his cheek against Ianto's. "Yes, I am," he said simply.

Ianto gave a small smile and a sigh as he relaxed as well. "Good. I don't want you to regret having done this."

Jack levered himself up to lean on one arm and made sure he made eye contact with the other man. "No matter what happens, Ianto, I will never regret the fact that I have the chance to really live a life with you."

Ianto met his eyes and to Jack's delight, he blushed furiously. "That is probably the soppiest thing I have ever heard you say," Ianto said a mock disgust, although the gleam in his eyes said otherwise.

"Oh? You think _that_ was soppy? That was _nothing_!" Jack exclaimed, realising that both of them had edged into deeper waters than they were comfortable with just yet. "I can make Hallmark look like amateur night if I want to. Let me see, now…"

"Jack…" Ianto said warningly, failing miserably to hold back his grin.

Jack matched it and let his other hand wander lazily in a southerly direction along ianto's body. "Of course, I could opt for actions speaking louder than words…" he said suggestively as he curved his fingers around Ianto's cock and started to fondle it.

Ianto's eyes lost focus as his body reacted strongly to Jack's touch. "Oh, yes," he managed after a moment. "I love a man of action."

With a mischievous grin, Jack set to repaying Ianto in kind for his earlier attentions and they left the more dangerously emotional waters behind them as they lost themselves in mutual pleasure. Jack knew that Ianto would still be watching out for him, both emotionally as well as physically, and he was determined to do the same. He'd missed so many chances in his life to date but this was one that he was determined to hang on to.

OOOO


End file.
